Endurance GB to formally adopt 'The Leading Rider Award' at major competitions

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

15 June 2017
 
Following extensive trials, 'The Leading Rider Award' will be formally launched at Endurance GB's major competitions, starting with Euston Park on the 17th and 18th of June. The award is the corner stone of the British Endurance Protocol, an initiative born from a joint working party, led by the British Equestrian Federation.

The purpose of the newly named Leading Rider Award (previously Good Horsemanship Award), is to reward what we believe to be clever riding, covering terrain competitively, but within the horse's means. The award gives points based on criteria judged throughout the competition and takes into account the recovery time of the horse, the CRI and consistency of speed. It's an evolving process and we welcome further feedback.
 
A full list of criteria can be found here. 
 
The award was first trialed at two national rides and two FEI rides, which enabled the working party to refine the criteria and produce an efficient way of capturing and managing the data.
 
The Leading Rider Award forms one part of a much wider British Endurance Protocol, which is looking to develop proposals to support good horse welfare, transparency and clean sport, positioning the UK as a champion for continued development in the sport. 

Great Britain: Runners and horses go head to head in marathon

Horseandhound.co.uk - Full Article

Sarah Radford
10:16 - 10 June, 2017

Nearly 700 runners and 60 horses will converge on Britain’s smallest town today (June 10) for an unusual 24-mile race.

The annual Man vs Horse marathon sees humans battling equines over the Welsh hills in a test of speed and endurance.

The event was conceived when Llanwrtyd Wells landlord Gordon Green overheard a discussion between two men in his pub, the Neuadd Arms. One suggested that a man would be as fast as a horse over a significant distance.

He decided to test the hypothesis, and organised the first event in 1980. The theory seemed to be swiftly disproved when rider Glyn Joes on Solomon beat fastest runner Dic Evans by 43 minutes.

Since then, however, a human has managed to triumph in the race on two occasions — Huw Lobb in 2004 and German runner Florian Holzinger in 2007...

Read more at http://www.horseandhound.co.uk/news/runners-horses-go-head-head-marathon-623315#R8w523AUYKC090dK.99

GB: Annie Joppe’s endurance blog: a nightmare journey and the art form of parking

Horseandhound.co.uk - Full Article

Annie Joppe
10:55 - 6 June, 2017

A week or so ago I spent a hectic three days helping at the famous Golden Horseshoe ride on Exmoor. This competition is about as different as you can get to Royal Windsor and still be ‘endurance’.

Windsor is fast, flat with excellent, and in part prepared, going and Horseshoe is rugged, rough and extremely hilly and the speeds considerably slower to reflect this. The challenges, and the rules to some extent, are very different and an alternative way of training the horse is required.

As usual, the event was not without rain and the venue is situated on top of a hill making it very exposed to the elements and usually up to 10 degrees cooler than the surrounding countryside.

‘Horseshoe’ is the oldest endurance competition in the UK and arguably one of the most famous in the world and certainly in this country. Two years ago, Horseshoe celebrated its 50th anniversary and had a break last year to be resurrected with new organisers who have great plans for the future...

Read more at http://www.horseandhound.co.uk/blog/annie-joppes-endurance-blog-nightmare-journey-art-form-parking-622722#BPbiU2wjSd97PJTZ.99

Maria Alvarez Ponton Leads Spain to Victory in Spanish Endurance Festival

Horsereporter.com - Full Article

Alvarez Ponton Tops two days of endurance

20 May 2017

The HH Sheikh Mansoor Bin Zayed Al Nahyan Global Arabian Horse Flat Racing Festival is supporting five endurance rides in Madrid including the 160-km ride and the Abu Dhabi-Madrid-Brussels Endurance Challenge, all FEI rides.

Alvarez Ponton finished the 160 FEI 3* ride in a time of 7:34:30 riding on an average speed of 21.12kmph. Second in almost five minutes later was Angel Soy Col riding Sheitan A Gwervaen (7:34:51, 21.10kmph), followed seconds later for third place was Anna Maria Tamerra on Girola De Quercus (7:34:52 seconds, 21.10 kmph).

The 160-km ride was run in five phases of 37km, 37km, 32km, 32km, and 22km. The 2 days of FEI endurance attracted top riders from Spain looking to book a berth on the National team for the coming international events, particularly the 2017 Grand Prix...

Read more here:
http://www.horsereporter.com/maria-alvarez-ponton-leads-spain-to-victory-in-spanish-endurance-festival/

Giraffes in view as the Boudheib Endurance rules get a run in South Africa

Horsetalk.co.nz - Full Article

June 3, 2017
Horsetalk.co.nz

The innovative Boudheib rules in Endurance were employed in South Africa last weekend, in the first in a series of international events, with a completion rate across all divisions of nearly 80 percent.

The rules applied at the Boudheib endurance facility in Abu Dhabi, owned by Sheikh Sultan Bin Zayed Al Nahyan, have created an oasis in troubled UAE Endurance. The “house” rules insisted on by the sheikh have all but eliminated the welfare issues that have plagued the sport in the region.

They are designed to keep speeds, which are GPS-monitored, down to 20kmh. Most prize-money goes to the best-conditioned horses, judged on the accumulation of scores from each vet gate.

South Africa played host last weekend to the first in the 2017 series of seven international Endurance events under Boudheib rules, with racing taking place in the Sondela Nature Reserve in the Limpopo Province...

Read more at http://www.horsetalk.co.nz/2017/06/03/giraffes-boudheib-endurance-rules-south-africa/#J4WZYEjFLbel1Isp.99

The Cup of Russia at the Tersk Stud Novotersky

Endurance-world.com - Full Article

Text provided by: Karina Voski

Tersk Stud, Novotersky, Russia. Sunday 28 May 2017. It was a place 500 meters above the sea level with a mountain-forest climate, similar to the climate of the middle Alps, sprinkling mineral water springs and extensive hilly grasslands that attracted Count Sergei Stroganov to create a stud farm at the foot of the picturesque Zmeika Mountain in 1898.

The backbone for this were 2 stallions and 9 mares brought from the journey through Syria and the North Arabian Desert.

In its nearly 120-year history, the stud farm has produced a whole galaxy of outstanding horses. Kumir, Drug, Nakhodka, Valuevka, Persik, Nobby are among them...

Read more here:
http://endurance-world.com/cup-russia-tersk-stud-novotersky/

Endurance Wastage: Even Worse Than You Probably Thought

Horse-canada.com - Full Article

Cuckson Report | May 30, 2017

I was sorry to miss the FEI’s endurance forum at Vic in Spain. I went to the 2014 version in Lausanne, the first specialist endurance open forum staged after the extent of the cheating, doping and attrition in FEI Group 7 and the UAE in particular came to wider attention.

Not much seems to have changed, other than officialdom now being less uncomfortable about openly naming the problem countries. And it would be difficult now not to name the UAE when they were suspended (2015) and stripped of running a world championship (2016) because of horse welfare concerns. Even three years ago it was taboo to mention a Group 7 federation by name in an open FEI endurance debate.

Given that weeny increase in transparency, I was disappointed to be told in February that the 2017 renewal was limited to national federations. By the time the FEI changed its mind in April and invited general observers, I had arranged to do something else, which could not be rescheduled without inconveniencing other people and causing me irrecoverable expense.
I am thus indebted to attendees who kept me posted and provided context to the presentations now available on the FEI website, and for amplifying the topics excluded from the FEI’s media round-up.

Much was made at both the main FEI sports forum in Lausanne in April and at Vic about extensive veterinary studies into bone fatigue and metabolic failures, and how they might be mitigated by extending rest periods. Another proposal that has got as far as a draft rule is adding an extra seven days’ rest where speed has exceeded an average 20kph. But why not actively cap high speeds, as successfully already trialled at Boudhieb? All the evidence is that Group 7 horses continue to train hard during compulsory “rests,” and turn up at national rides – over which the FEI is always keen to tell us it has no jurisdiction or knowledge. A half-way house measure will merely encourage Group 7 to buy even more horses...

Read more here:
https://www.horse-canada.com/cuckson-report/endurance-wastage-even-worse-than-you-probably-thought/