Equine college problems

littlemisslauren said:
My post reads far more ar*sey than it should. I apologise, it was late and I feel very strongly on weightlimits.

Does your college have ANY weightlimit? Surely if an 18stone plus rider turned up you wouldnt expect your horses to carry them, as well as all other heavy riders?

I am not at all 'fattist' I have battled with my weight my whole life, including a lfe long battle with Bulimia. But to me welfare of the horse comes before my pride.

(sorry for any missing lettrs - keyboard playing up)
Click to expand...

I think there has to be a weight limit, but 14.5 stone is abit tight to me. I am 5'5 and slim build size 12 and weigh 12 stone!!!! Well 11.11 now, I managed to shed a couple walking xc courses ;-) the trouble is, there is no communication and generally who ever runs the yard will not communicate to the academic staff who perform the interviews of such weight limits so they are accepted onto the course and then things like this happen. I must admit I have never come accross a weight limit, the most common is they have been accepted onto the wrong level course which is just as much of a confidence knock to be told you are moving down a level. Tbh 14 stone isn't a lot and some of our draft cobby types could do it in their sleep. I think if it was ovbious that someone was larger then a place should not be offered untill it is established that there are horses capable of the job, if not then the learner is not offered a place, but alot do offer places as it bumps up the numbers! due to the amount of students that would be accessing the yard they would be open to a huge amount of opinions, and more often than not, someone calls a welfare team because they do not agree with how they do things, this happened when I was a student. It's difficult to monitor weight as often when you ask people to disclose their weight they waver the truth slightly and asking them to get on scales is also debatable. As far as the learner is concerned, you should have the facilities (animals) to cater for all. There are horses out there more than capable of carrying weight but they are not readily available. (appologies for any typos, still havnt got to grips with this iPad! )
 
china said:
I think there has to be a weight limit, but 14.5 stone is abit tight to me. I am 5'5 and slim build size 12 and weigh 12 stone!!!! Well 11.11 now, I managed to shed a couple walking xc courses ;-) the trouble is, there is no communication and generally who ever runs the yard will not communicate to the academic staff who perform the interviews of such weight limits so they are accepted onto the course and then things like this happen. I must admit I have never come accross a weight limit, the most common is they have been accepted onto the wrong level course which is just as much of a confidence knock to be told you are moving down a level. Tbh 14 stone isn't a lot and some of our draft cobby types could do it in their sleep. I think if it was ovbious that someone was larger then a place should not be offered untill it is established that there are horses capable of the job, if not then the learner is not offered a place, but alot do offer places as it bumps up the numbers! due to the amount of students that would be accessing the yard they would be open to a huge amount of opinions, and more often than not, someone calls a welfare team because they do not agree with how they do things, this happened when I was a student. It's difficult to monitor weight as often when you ask people to disclose their weight they waver the truth slightly and asking them to get on scales is also debatable. As far as the learner is concerned, you should have the facilities (animals) to cater for all. There are horses out there more than capable of carrying weight but they are not readily available. (appologies for any typos, still havnt got to grips with this iPad! )
Click to expand...

I understand all of your points, too well for my liking:rolleyes:

I do belive that yes there is a hose out there that will carry 18 stone, but will they carry that weight all day every day and stay sound? We have tried that route and failed several times. It doesnt take long for those higher up to get peed off with extra costs :o I'm not sure about your college obviously but the ones I know require the horse to work up to 3 hours a day, resulting in sore backs for those only ever faced with 14stone plus riders (often the more novice rider too)

I think a huge amount of these issues of course stems from the need for numbers and the amount of learners placed on each course as fillers. It seems a lot of colleges do not have the resources for larger riders, yet they are accepting them. I know some offer a non riding module to compensate.

But once the learner enters the big wide world they will be faced with weight limits and scales, nobody can be shielded from their weight forever!
 
Sounds like the college have dealt with it very badly; anything like this should be made abundantly clear from the start.

I do think that colleges and riding schools need to have weight restrictions though, saying they should cater for all is great in an ideal world, but surely you have to draw the line somewhere? If someone 20st plus wanted to join the course, should the college have to go and buy something to suit? I don't know any college or RS who want to turn customers away, yet it is being made out that they are in the wrong for imposing weight limits..

I also don't know many yards who don't have a weight limit for working pupils, though it may not be stated implicitly.
 
littlemisslauren said:
I understand all of your points, too well for my liking:rolleyes:

I do belive that yes there is a hose out there that will carry 18 stone, but will they carry that weight all day every day and stay sound? We have tried that route and failed several times. It doesnt take long for those higher up to get peed off with extra costs :o I'm not sure about your college obviously but the ones I know require the horse to work up to 3 hours a day, resulting in sore backs for those only ever faced with 14stone plus riders (often the more novice rider too)

I think a huge amount of these issues of course stems from the need for numbers and the amount of learners placed on each course as fillers. It seems a lot of colleges do not have the resources for larger riders, yet they are accepting them. I know some offer a non riding module to compensate.

But once the learner enters the big wide world they will be faced with weight limits and scales, nobody can be shielded from their weight forever!
Click to expand...

We are lucky that we have enough horses that they are usually only ridden once, perhaps twice a day. It's usually the good horses that are used the most as they are so reliable. But they get 6 weeks holibobs etc. I completely agree that accepting them does not set them up for the real world in the equine industry and some respects you are setting them up for a failure if they wish to do things such as racing. Colleges tend to tread carefully otherwise they set themselves up for being persecuted for not providing equal opportunities for all and making their college inlcusive. If they require a weight limit they should state this clearly to cover their backs, including during interview. If the learner wishes to disclose there weight incorrectly the college has done their part. This also brings into question though, why would you feel the need to lie about your weight, it all gets abit deep! Never ending :-)
 
I let an equine college loan my horse and as an owner I don't want anyone over 13 stone riding her. Just my view on what is fair for my horse in that it does get worked reasonably hard by pupils of varying ability. What I am saying is the college have to pay respect to the owners and the horses as well as the pupils.

Just as a thought, maybe your daughters horse could go to the college on full time loan and that would be a tactful way of ensuring she has a good horse to ride?
 
Her mum went to the college Friday, and has some sort of resolution, or compromise, she discovered she knew one of the horses on loan, the shire x , and contacted the owner who said she is happy with my niece riding this horse for next few weeks, neice has lost. Few pounds this week, and is happy to diet to under 14 st. She has no weight hang ups thank goodness. We all understand weight limits, but not one single mention of it when she enrolled or had riding assessment in July . It is not a big well known college. So some sort of solution found and by October she will hope to have lost half a stone to get weight down. She is home weekends to ride her own horse anyway.
Been stressful week for her bless her. Her mum was bouncing at start of week tho!
 
Load of rubbish in my eyes. That's surely the average weight of a man? So would they turn them away? I think not...

And yes, it should have been made clear from day one. They are also a college who should have horses to accommodate different types of riders.

Definitely address the matter with them and tell her not to worry :)
 
littlemisslauren said:
I do belive that yes there is a horse out there that will carry 18 stone, but will they carry that weight all day every day and stay sound?
Click to expand...

There are plenty of horses will carry 18 stone all day in the hunting field, so I can't see a problem getting one to carry an above-weight-limit rider a couple of times a day with rest periods in between. Luckily my OH isn't quite that weight yet but he's certainly not the lightest rider in the world. I have 2 in work to try to replace his old horse - both home-bred - and one of them would easily carry 20 stone hunting, AND he can gallop (although he'dget time faults on a xc course :D) He's not excessively huge - 17 hh, 10.5" of bone and a very short back, deep girth, broad chest! He's by an RID out of a TBxPercheron mare. The other is pure ID - same height and bone, but not quite as much depth and - at this stage - would probably only carry 17 stone!

My husband's old horse would have carried 17 stone at a push, but carried between 14 and 16 stone all his life. He hunted to 23 years of age by which time he wasn't 100% sound, but sound enough!
 
Just put those stats into an online bmi calculator, and it comes back with a bmi of 25.8, where healthy weight is 18.5-24.9. So yes it wouldn't hurt her to lose those 5lb, as she does count as overweight on the bmi thingy. Still really unfair that they didn't tell her that before the holidays so she could have done something about it before college started.
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Top