Well there was certainly nothing relaxed and flowing about that ride. Totilas is a gorgeous horse it's such a shame that he is being tortured with the barbaric practice of Rollkur.
Maybe the letter signed at the end of the film by some of the more prominent horse people in the industry will do some good, I doubt it. Until the judges stop rewarding this sort of behavior in the ring and crowds stop showing up to cheer their heroes on but turn away in disgust I fear this practice will continue. Money and egos are involved. A ruling must come down from the top to put an end to the misery endured by these horses who are victims of Rollkur.
The text of the letter and signatures at the end of the video are very hard to read (red text reversed out on black is illegible) but I could swear that Matthias Rath is one of the undersigned.
(I looked up the text of the letter to double check and indeed Matthias Rath is one of the undersigned. Bizarre...
I should have noted that the letter and signatures are from (note the date) February 2010 - the irony being that apparently Matthias Rath was opposed to rollkur until he started riding Totilas, was not doing too well with him and on some occasions nearly got thrown off, and now he is, as the footage shows, using extreme rollkur as part of his warm-up routine.
Sometimes I am in such a rush to get things posted and get back to the barn I don't make myself clear! :)
Seeing this just makes me want to take Totilas to the beach in a straight snaffle & let him have a long canter & a roll.
I'd like to take all teh Rollkur practitioners to the same beach & make then work for an hour with their chins fixed to their chests & see how they feel!
And we persist in saying that human are at the top of the evolutionary chain....
Horrendous, what else can I say? The brace in that young man's body. I wonder what it has done to him (Matthias) to feel he has to change from his former principled stance against rollkur? That poor, poor horse.
7 comments:
Well there was certainly nothing relaxed and flowing about that ride. Totilas is a gorgeous horse it's such a shame that he is being tortured with the barbaric practice of Rollkur.
Maybe the letter signed at the end of the film by some of the more prominent horse people in the industry will do some good, I doubt it. Until the judges stop rewarding this sort of behavior in the ring and crowds stop showing up to cheer their heroes on but turn away in disgust I fear this practice will continue. Money and egos are involved. A ruling must come down from the top to put an end to the misery endured by these horses who are victims of Rollkur.
Not enjoyable to watch...
The text of the letter and signatures at the end of the video are very hard to read (red text reversed out on black is illegible) but I could swear that Matthias Rath is one of the undersigned.
(I looked up the text of the letter to double check and indeed Matthias Rath is one of the undersigned. Bizarre...
I should have noted that the letter and signatures are from (note the date) February 2010 - the irony being that apparently Matthias Rath was opposed to rollkur until he started riding Totilas, was not doing too well with him and on some occasions nearly got thrown off, and now he is, as the footage shows, using extreme rollkur as part of his warm-up routine.
Sometimes I am in such a rush to get things posted and get back to the barn I don't make myself clear! :)
Seeing this just makes me want to take Totilas to the beach in a straight snaffle & let him have a long canter & a roll.
I'd like to take all teh Rollkur practitioners to the same beach & make then work for an hour with their chins fixed to their chests & see how they feel!
And we persist in saying that human are at the top of the evolutionary chain....
D, I wish you could take him for that beach ride. I would LOVE to see him relaxing and totally free to move however he felt like.
Horrendous, what else can I say? The brace in that young man's body. I wonder what it has done to him (Matthias) to feel he has to change from his former principled stance against rollkur? That poor, poor horse.
Maire, that is the million dollar question - how is he reconciling this kind of riding?
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