Badminton 1973... Rewriting the rules...

Queenbee

Queenbee

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Saw this many years ago and thought I would share for those who haven't seen it.... Remember the rules state in between the flags and OVER the jump!

The 1973 Badminton Horse Trials was very muddy and slick that year. The jump was a cross country Trakehner jump with some elements of a coffin jump: a down slope leading to a wide ditch with a horizontal tree trunk positioned over it, with a gentle up-slope on the opposite side. I’ve also heard this referred to as a Stockholm fence.

This was Bayliss and Gurgle the Greek’s first time at Badminton. Reportedly, Gurgle the Greek balked at the muddy takeoff to jump #16, slid sideways under the jump with Bayliss still remaining mounted and upright, and scrambled up the other side. It is rumored that jump #16 eliminated somewhere between 27 to 30 horses that year due to refusals.


At first someone objected and Bayliss was eliminated. However, the fence judge, possibly Willy Poole, pointed out the rules stated “passing between the flags” ruled a jump cleared, which she had done. After a bit of deliberation, it was determined that she legitimately cleared the jump within the current rules of that competition. Bayliss was reinstated and the jump officially counted as cleared for the pair.

The rules were rewritten for the following year, “no fence must be built that it is possible for a horse to go under”. The new rule was geared to the course designer/technical delegate/ground jury, rather than the riders, to stop any questionable repeats of this amazing accidental feat.
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armchair_rider said:
Heard the story many times but never seen a picture so thanks for posting it. Must have been quite a sight
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I was actually thinking about it just now, I saw the pic in a fab article in H&H a few years ago... Have googled it many times and never found it, but today it turned up straight away in my search... Fab story and pic... Thought I'd share :)
 
I was there too, my one and only visit to Badminton. I loved Gurgle the Greek, I used to go to Chatsworth every year and he always went round there well, over the jumps.:D
 
Funny thing was that from my perspective all the fences were so enormous it seemed almost sensible to go under :D The crowds were obviously much smaller and it was quite normal for the Queen to drive up to a fence in her Landrover and get out next to you to watch :D

We used to go every year with our PC branch. Julian Seaman used to teach us at PC and his best horse was called Master Question and they did well for several years. Then he got a grey called The Reverend who was a bit bouncy and one year (would have to do some research) he fell off it several times, got back on and continued :) Which of course isn't allowed either these days :D
 
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