BE minimum height for ponies

[benrolo]

My daughter's pony measures (not officially) about 140.5 cms, the minimum height for BE is 142cms. Some of her friends are doing BE this year and he is more than capable of competing at intro or pre novice but would we get away with it on a ticket just to see how it went? Does anyone know why they have this rule?

 

[jumptoit]

I know of ponies that are registered and getting placings that are BSJA 138cm ponies with life height certificates. Many at events are blatantly smaller than 142cm and I have never seen it challenged.

 

[TableDancer]

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I know of ponies that are registered and getting placings that are BSJA 138cm ponies with life height certificates. Many at events are blatantly smaller than 142cm and I have never seen it challenged.

[/ QUOTE ]

She's right - we did it

 

[Thistle]

Totally agree

 

[Pep12]

Correct me if I am wrong but I think to register they need to be 142cm on a day ticket it is smaller / different (can't remember the height- sorry).

 

[Pep12]

Ok - Just looked at rules and it appears that 142cm is the height whatever the situation. I guess a lot of people choose to ignore this rule and if challeneged will say 142cm?? At 140 you could get away with it i would think.

 

[benrolo]

Thanks everyone, maybe we will have a go, that's if we can get a place!

 

[Skhosu]

I would think you would get away with it....

 

[LisaHughes]

sorry to be a killjoy but I don't think it is a question of getting away with it. The rules are there for a reason and courses are built on horse distances not pony ones. It doesn't matter how talented the pony is, if it is always trying to fiddle the distance it is bound to come unstuck at some point. It would appear that one of the contributing factors to Ian olding's death was the odd distance in that combination. It's a high risk sport so why would you want to stack the odds against you? You also have to think about the fact that if it somehow caused an accident (thinking about WFP's freak tack breakage recently) you would have no insurance cover as you had falsely registered your pony.

 

[TableDancer]

lch, interesting input. However the issue of making distances applies as much to the 14 hands - 14.2ers competing as it does to the odd 13.3 pony out there. A number of factors come into play, including the natural scope of the pony and its stride length, as well as size. We've actually sold our old pony and bought a new one as our beloved old boy, although an unbelievable performer at Intro, had neither the scope nor the stride length to go higher. But the new pony is barely an inch higher, yet can open up to a horse stride as well as having unlimited scope.

Most ponies competing over BE courses chip in extra strides where needed and are plenty clever enough to do so at least at Intro and PN. Bear in mind that many PC events are held over the same xc courses anyway so the problem applies just as much there, and in the SJ the worst that is likely to happen if a pony can't make the distance is a few poles down or a stop.

I guess it is up to anyone considering competing a pony to take responsibility for whether it, and the jockey, are capapble of the questions being asked of them. For the record, in 6 events contested last year, our under-size pony finished with a 1st, 2nd, 4th, 6th - better than most twice his size! But I didn't feel that it would be fair to ask him the bigger questions which is why we didn't do so.

As far as your insurance point is concerned I think you are stretching it a bit: if you suggested that any BSJA member whose pony turned out to be not exactly the size it is registered as would not have insurance cover, there would be a lot of uninsured members out there

 

[LisaHughes]

but surely you can register a pony with the BSJA as there are specific classes for them, whereas the BE rules state that a pony has to be a particular height to be registered, therefore by default anything under that height is "illegal"? If I as an organiser ended up with an insurance problem (and I've never yet met an insurance company that didn't jump at the opportunity not to pay a claim) because someone had knowingly registered a pony that they knew they shouldn't have, I wouldn't be very happy!
Don't get me wrong I'm a huge fan of ponies & I used to event a little horse that i believed to be 15hh, and he cheerfully jumped round novice tracks but he when he was measured for his life height certificate he came back as 14.1 3/4 and after that became an FEI pony. As you say it isn't probably going to be too much of a problem at intro & PN where the fences are less technical & combinations are limited, but there is nothing to stop a pony that is doing well at that level then being pushed up through the grades.
I completely take your point about the way of going being more relevant than the height but a line has to be drawn somewhere surely? I actually don't think that 14hh ponies should be doing BE, or children aged 12, but that's a whole different argument!

 

[TableDancer]

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I actually don't think that 14hh ponies should be doing BE, or children aged 12, but that's a whole different argument!

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Why am I not surprised to hear this

Think we'd better agree to disagree on this one, although as an organiser I would have thought you would be pleased to take anyone's money - I know we are at our event

As far as the BSJA thing is concerned, same applies as with BE - ponies are registered as one thing and can be quite another although admittedly in this case they are usually BIGGER than they are supposed to be not smaller

TBH if there were to be a random accident a la WFP's near-miss, it seems unlikely in the extreme to me that the first thing people would do is to reach for their measuring sticks to see if a pony was half an inch smaller than it was registered as

 

[LisaHughes]

I feel strongly that there is a huge bottleneck at the lower end of the sport which means that so many people pay good money to register and then find it very difficult to get a run...... which isn't good for them & isn't good for the sport. We fit in as many as humanely possible but i always feel awful about those we turn away - for example last year it would have been 300+ if we hadn't decided to run the 4th day.

I don't think the measuring stick would be the first thing that was reached for..... but I do think if there was a calamity it would be very thoroughly investigated & it would only take one or two people to say "wasn't that the tiny pony" and it would be something that was very easy to follow up

 

[worMy]

i think any height pony has the right to compete at BE if it is capable.
and small ponies will be ridden by young riders, and therefore to go up the grades they will have to qualify and prove they can cope with the level and the striding etc.
if the pony cannot cope then it will not be able to go above intro/PN as it wont be able to cope therefore qualify, if you get me.
and its unlikely a pony that cannot cope at intro/pn will have a mjor accident, as they are clever creatures and if really in trouble, it will just stop.

it would be a huge shame if people said ponies under 14hh cant do BE, just think of the huge talent out there that would be wasted,,,,think of theodore o'connor,,,, 14 1hh and round 4* tracks!! RIP little guy!


sorry load of ramble!

 

[Thistle]

BE do have a sort of safety net at higher levels.

14.2 and under can't go above Nov without special permission