Jeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeesus

[FMM]

W/E


at the end of the day horses are horses no matter what the price a human puts on its head.

All I am saying is I will not pay mega bucks on a horse.


A horse can be bought for allot of money they injure itself or be put down then its not worth much,
nuff said

No idea what W/E means ...

Horses are horses? What point are you trying to make?
For that matter ...
And cars are cars
Jewellery is jewellery
etc etc etc

Anyway. No one is asking YOU to spend mega bucks on a horse. The point being made is that it is up to each individual and you are not being criticised by anyone for spending peanuts on a horse - therefore someone who spends 3 or4 figure sums on a horse should equally not be criticised by YOU.

 

[Lark]

Have not read every post but most.
As others have said a 35k FEI pony is genuinely on the cheap side.
Most of the top ponies are passed from one kid to another and bought for £££ based on their proven ability at the top level, take both Quantum Light (sj) and Ice Cool Bailey (Eventing)for example they have brought four or five different children to the top and the price of the ponies is definitely reflected in that. The other factor is that if you spent that type of money on a 'proven' top pony you would hope to recoup the cost when selling on to the next generation; if they sound and sane of course. With those 2 ponies in particular most of the outgrown jockeys have progressed to horses at a very competitive level so you could argue that the pony was a wise investment.
Are they priviledged...no doubt. However in my experience these 14, 15 and 16 year olds are equally as ambitious as the parents that are bank rolling them.

 

[Mithras]

Naive AND patronising.

And I deliberately did not include athletics because this is one area where it is far easier for children from less well off families to do well. The pony jumping brigade are still selected on the basis of their talent as a child that has no talent will STILL not be able to compete at top level, no matter what pony they have. It is also easier for athletics to get sponsorship than it is for children riding. Most of the child sponsorship is from family owned companies. And RtE made a good point about Katie Price ...

But children of limited talent can compete alongside more talented children, at least as long as the megabucks pony keeps going for them.

I think this sort of attitude is probably why public interest is so low in equine sports at the moment. My talented runner friends all think that the horse does it all - that is their perecption of equine based sports, as members of the public. Its not just athletics where you need far more money than talent to succeed - its many of our most popular sports - football (pushy parents will only get you so far along the selection process), cycling, triathlon, swimming, etc..

What you are saying is almost the same as saying that any short person could ride the winner of the Derby and beat all the professional jockeys ... just because they were on the "best" horse ...

Not at all. The difference is that jockeys don't become successful due to parents buying them megabucks horses. They work their apprenticeships, learn their trade, and get progressively better rides based on talent and results.

 

[Mithras]

Anyway. No one is asking YOU to spend mega bucks on a horse. The point being made is that it is up to each individual and you are not being criticised by anyone for spending peanuts on a horse - therefore someone who spends 3 or4 figure sums on a horse should equally not be criticised by YOU.

I don't think its criticism. Its scepticism. All we're saying is that we are not particularly taken in by the supposed "talent" of all of the pony riders who depend on parents to buy them successful proven ponies. I found the name dropping of famous ponies in this thread alongside fairly tenuous connections quite cringe-making.

So did Zara Phillips get bought megabucks ponies as a child so she could make it to the top? Or is it just a typical new money trait of spoiling their children?

Edited to add that with the Katie Price example (perhaps not the best one), I have no problem with people using money they have earned themselves to spend how they wish.

 

[FMM]

I don't think its criticism. Its scepticism. All we're saying is that we are not particularly taken in by the supposed "talent" of all of the pony riders who depend on parents to buy them successful proven ponies. I found the name dropping of famous ponies in this thread alongside fairly tenuous connections quite cringe-making.

So did Zara Phillips get bought megabucks ponies as a child so she could make it to the top? Or is it just a typical new money trait of spoiling their children?

Edited to add that with the Katie Price example (perhaps not the best one), I have no problem with people using money they have earned themselves to spend how they wish.

Do you think that Zara Phillips had £250 ponies and then suddenly became a world beating eventer when she hit her 20s?

 

[lhotse]

I. I found the name dropping of famous ponies in this thread alongside fairly tenuous connections quite cringe-making.


.

I'm not sure if you are aiming that comment at me?
Tenuous connection being that the pony was set on the right course in life, we owned him for 18 months, and took him from being a pony who did exactly what he wanted to a pony who could work in a proper outline, hack out without taking the mick and actually be useful rather than just a pet as he was in his previous home. I really couldn't have cared if he had just gone on to be a regular pony club pony. The fact that he has become what he is now is not down to me, but to say that I am namedropping just for the sake of it is rather off.

 

[RunToEarth]

My horse went, but I was at work when Lincoln was on!!!

Doing the coloureds on Tuesday and cobs on Wednesday at Great Yorkshire - shout if you see me (well, if you see Dinger who is easier to spot!!!!) Are you competing?

I will look out for you, no I'm not now, going with the golden gon palace and co because oshk is moving to lincs and grey boy hasn't done any showing this season!
Diamond-light- expensive make up is better quality, expensive shoes are made better and last longer than a cheap pair, people pay for quality.
Attitudes like yours "a horse is a horse" are the reason there are so many badly bred,mismatched horses with bad conformation, which doesn't do the horsey world any favours.

 

[Lanky Loll]

I'm not sure if you are aiming that comment at me?
Tenuous connection being that the pony was set on the right course in life, we owned him for 18 months, and took him from being a pony who did exactly what he wanted to a pony who could work in a proper outline, hack out without taking the mick and actually be useful rather than just a pet as he was in his previous home. I really couldn't have cared if he had just gone on to be a regular pony club pony. The fact that he has become what he is now is not down to me, but to say that I am namedropping just for the sake of it is rather off.

I thought it was aimed at a few of us including me! Nothing like trying to establish common ground Anyway - they were examples of expensive ponies I thought, showing that this one certainly isn't unusual - or that expensive for what it's asked to do.

 

[lhotse]

Exactly!!

 

[MrsMozartletoe]

*flaps lazily in to the maelstrom*

It's all relative:

If I had the income and a spare £35k and my daughter liked and wanted a £35k pony, I would buy it for her;

or

If I had the income and a spare £500 and my daughter likes and wanted a £500 pony, I would buy if for her.

Who is to say what is and what is not an okay price to spend? I have a watch that cost more than a lot of people paid for their horse, but who's business is that but my own? I have the money, I wanted the watch, I bought it.

If the argument is because it is for a child, does that mean that as a parent one should only buy from Primark because it is only for a child, when the household income is sufficient to allow one to buy from, say Gap?

As to pressures, many children are born with a drive to be the absolute best that they can be, and as parents, we do what we can to support them in their ambitions.

D1 is ambitious and wants to do well in BSJA. D and I could buy her a stonkingly good (and by 'good' I mean expensive) horse, but she would rather have the money spent on a vet school education. We can afford to do one or the other, not both, and she has chosen. If she had chosen the horse, then we'd have another one added to our hairy gang.

Our money, our choice

 

[Lolo]

Can I also add that with FEI pony trials, you're sending a pony round a course that is about 30cm smaller than itself- the child on top has to want to do it/ be able to ride well enough to cover the lack of want to even get over the simple fences let alone the technical big stuff. Soon, 6 of the best children will be jetting off to Poland to compete at the international pony thingy. Those kids SERIOUSLY want it! I know several Pony Programme children and they work so hard to get there and stay at the top, but to have a pony who'll help you out costs money. Even the not-so-good ones will cost over £10k of they'll go clear XC happily...

Children who stick with it in any sport are the ones whose parents can afford the best coaching, the best equipment, the best help. The ones left to fight it alone are much much rarer although more loved by the general public.

FWIW- people liek Will Fox Pitt and Pippa Funnell had lovely ponies or really good first horses. Oli T did Pony Trials on good ponies. It gives you a bsaic grounding and foothold that slogging along with the naughty and untalented ponies won't. Speaking as someone who's watched her sister slogging with the naughty ponies, I don't envy the pony people one jot other than for the money. They work bloody hard to be that good.

 

[xspiralx]

Originally Posted by BrambleandMonty


I mean, there's no other """""sport""""" like it, is there? Lewis Hamilton wouldn't have had a F1 car bought for him, he grew up on go karts, got the sponsorship. I doubt Andy Murrays tennis racket cost £35,000. My jaw just dropped, £35,000! For a child!

I'm sorry OP but I had to laugh at this. Formula 1 [and the lower levels of racing] are well known for being absolutely phenomenally expensive.

Please see below from the Silverstone website for clarification:

As a guideline, a rookie year in club racing can cost from £5000 up to £30,000+. Career minded drivers with their eyes set on higher championships must expect to pay considerably more.

For example, an inaugural season in Formula Ford can cost upwards of £50,000, a place on the Seat Cupra Championship grid costs close to £80,000 while a year in the junior Formula BMW Championship could set you back as much as £180,000.

Further up the motor sport ladder, higher profile championships such as Formula 3 and British Touring Cars require budgets in the region of £250,000 and upwards per annum.

Those are the costs just per year. Makes a 35k pony look like small fry eh? Lewis Hamilton's dad had to change his career and work a few jobs in order to support his son's sport. So your argument here is faintly ridiculous.

To reply to your original post. Undoubtedly there are pushy parents who drive their kids to succeed; on the other end of the scale there are bratty kids who don't appreciate the opportunities their parents provide them with.

However neither of those things really has anything to do with a pony costing 35k - there will be plenty of children who desperately want to succeed, who want to get to the absolute top, who love riding, and competing and winning - and if their parents can afford to provide them with a pony who can take them there, why shouldn't they?

 

[Suziq77]

You don't know what it feels like to be in that situation in the same way that someone who spends £35k on a pony doesn't know what it is like to be you. Just give it a rest and appreciate your life for what it is and let everyone else get on with theirs!!! And I have read what you have written. You HAVEN'T written this 1000 times.

To be fair, how do you KNOW how a child with a £35k pony lives their lives. I could tell you, (having had contact with children who HAVE had that money spent on them - not me I hasten to add - I wish!!!!) but no matter WHAT I told you, you just would not listen. You have a fixed idea in your head and nothing anyone says will change your mind.

So - no point writing what you think the remaining 995 times (to make it up to your 1000 times) - as most people appear not to agree with you.

Totally agree, I was lucky enough to get rides on some fabulous ponies when I was younger, admittedly most of those were ones that were tricky to ride, which gave me many happy memories and great experience. I just loved riding and actively often chose not to go to parties/discos and declined to go abroad on annual summer holidays choosing instead to stay at the houses of people I was riding for. My summer holidays were spent at the BSPS champs and Ponies (UK) with my favourite ponies. I had no idea how lucky I was and no comprehension of what these ponies had cost their owners. My parents never pushed me and I think were slightly concerned how obsessed I was with it all...

My favourite pony of all time was my 15hh WHP who came to me as a just backed 5 year old having been sent back by the first person who bought him as he was apparently a tyrant, he failed the vet and I insisted that we buy him anyway - he cost £1,300 which was quite a lot for a very green and allegedly difficult pony in the late 1980s.

I still had no idea how much more the ponies which came from producers yards cost / were worth and none of it really sunk in until I'd left ponies to concentrate on university. Having spent ten years working flat out in the City I can now afford show horses again. If I had kids would I buy them a County level lead rein pony - you bet! But if they didn't take to it then so be it, I would consider whether I wanted to keep the pony and offer another child the chance to compete as I had.

I bet a lot of these kids will realise how lucky they are at a much later stage. I'm sure those referred to above such as WFP and Pippa fully appreciate the advantages they had and remember their ponies very fondly indeed. Surely if you have the money to be able to give your child those memories then you would do so?

 

[Mithras]

I'm not sure if you are aiming that comment at me?
Tenuous connection being that the pony was set on the right course in life, we owned him for 18 months, and took him from being a pony who did exactly what he wanted to a pony who could work in a proper outline, hack out without taking the mick and actually be useful rather than just a pet as he was in his previous home. I really couldn't have cared if he had just gone on to be a regular pony club pony. The fact that he has become what he is now is not down to me, but to say that I am namedropping just for the sake of it is rather off.

I must apologise. Its just that I find the name dropping segment of the horsy world a bit distasteful, as I do boasting or even its sister, boasting by stealth. Fortunately there are plenty of top riders who do neither. I would hazard a guess that many of us have had our moments under the spotlight and our connections with the aristocracy (of the horsy world) but I don't particularly enjoy reading a thread that morphs into a series of boasts trying to outdo each other. Although when the name dropping extends to expensive ponies, it is quite funny!

What is this thread about anyway? My viewpoint is simply that I don't particularly admire or get excited about the so-called talents of children with pushy rich parents (actually in any sport). I have to say its hard to get as excited as the parents about the achievements of their offspring at junior level! I also think the world is littered with such children who succeeded as juniors but who fell apart as seniors, and doubt the efficacy of it as a method of producing success. At least long term as opposed to a few flash in the pan promising years as a senior.

Theres also a difference between good, safe but relatively ordinary ponies and learning how to get the best out of them and those freakishly good ponies that remarkably go for any rider (or is it just coincidence that such ponies are always bought by parents of terribly talented riders?)

Multiply these thoughts when you are talking about a string of megabucks ponies or indeed "children" in their twenties still being bankrolled by mum and dad.

 

[lhotse]

I am not boasting to outdo anyone. I merely posted, in jest, that a pony I sold for 700 quid fetched what I do consider to be a ridiculous amount of money. I didn't mention his name, but posted a link to a photo, as I thought people might like to see what a £700 pony looks like!!!

I have nothing to do with the competitive side of equestrianism, it doesn't interest me, and to be honest, neither do 'famous' names. They are only people afterall, it's the rest who put them on a pedlestal.

Actually, I do regret letting him go, he would have made a lovely hack about for me and the family.

 

[Mithras]

Fair enough. It wasn't only you that my "pony name-dropping comment" was intended for.

People can do what they like. All I'm saying is that personally, I don't especially rate people who have success bought for them by their parents.

I have however seen what untalented riders can do to top ponies. My friend had a top 14.2 JA, which her parents had paid a lot of money for from another top pony rider who had produced it. When she was out of the age group, she sold it onto a family I knew. Unfortunately their daughter couldn't ride for toffee. This was one of the JA ponies I mentioned I had ridden. It really was the most lovely, responsive, yet easy, push button ride, so supple and easy to turn, lovely mouth, etc.. Smooth as silk. Yet the new owners couldn't do anything with it, it was passed down the food chain and never heard of (in jumping terms) again.

And of all its former riders, only the first (the producer) is still competing. (not including myself).

 

[Hackie]

Well I personally wouldn't ever pay tens of thousands for a horse, simply as I've never had the money to do so! In search of a quality animal that would be competitive, I've always had to buy a nice, green horse for less money and turn it into what I've wanted.

However, as a breeders, our family have sold plenty for serious money, and quite often for children. And I have no issues with that, as these horses have been/gone on to be the best in their state (in Aus) and their prices reflect that.

At the end of the day, in order to compete at the top in any equestrian sport, you need to have a quality animal under you. If you are lucky, you might get a bargain somewhere, however supply and demand for truly well educated, well tempered quality animals is such that they are more often than not, expensive. But what parent wouldn't want to put their child on such a horse, given the opportunity? In our experience, it actually hasn't been pushy rich parents spending heaps of cash to get their averagely talented children into the ribbons, but rather genuinely talented, hard working kids, whose parents have sacrificed to buy them the best horse they could to support them as they pursue their ambitions.

I don't think that its a case of buying success as such, as after the sale, the work still needs to be done to get into the ring. Of course, there are instances where the purchase doesn't go well, and for whatever reason the combination falls apart, but having sold for a lot and a little, that can happen whether the horse in question was sold for a few hundred or for tens of thousands. Its incredibly disappointing as a seller, but all you can do when you sell any horse is do all the homework you can to ensure they go to the right home and hope that you've done the right thing, and you never have a crystal ball.

 

[sprytzer]

FMM I agree 100%. Ever heard of Colton Maelstrom (sp) the JA pony that sold for 3 quaters of a million in the late nineties. she was incredible and worth every penny.

My daughter used to compete on her JA against this pony on the Scottish circuit about 17yrs ago, on a pony that at the time we paid a lot of money for...yet she had more results on a £600 pony bought from Thainstone mart, working her way up from nothing to a 2nd in the Barrs JC/JD champs at the Royal Highland, she also had more fun (her words) on said pony than the mega bucks pony.

 

[Lanky Loll]

Fair enough. It wasn't only you that my "pony name-dropping comment" was intended for.

People can do what they like. All I'm saying is that personally, I don't especially rate people who have success bought for them by their parents.

I have however seen what untalented riders can do to top ponies. My friend had a top 14.2 JA, which her parents had paid a lot of money for from another top pony rider who had produced it. When she was out of the age group, she sold it onto a family I knew. Unfortunately their daughter couldn't ride for toffee. This was one of the JA ponies I mentioned I had ridden. It really was the most lovely, responsive, yet easy, push button ride, so supple and easy to turn, lovely mouth, etc.. Smooth as silk. Yet the new owners couldn't do anything with it, it was passed down the food chain and never heard of (in jumping terms) again.

And of all its former riders, only the first (the producer) is still competing. (not including myself).

I'm pretty certain I'm the other person it was aimed at
Maybe The Hooligan and I could have looked for common ground via PM but it was done on the forum, which is where most of the "name dropping" was done.
Anywhooo they were examples of good ponies that people paid a lot of money for much like Lhotse's lovely pony, and which other people might have heard of, once again to establish that it's not unusual for these ponies to be sold for that sort of money.
Not all of these expensive ponies are push button rides either, but they are by their very ability freaks of nature, which the right rider manages to get a tune out of, as you know it doesn't always work and you see them being passed down and sometimes out of the competition world, but it's not always the case.

 

[Oaksflight]

Did anyone see that advert>>> FEI pony



Now I understand the cost of serious sports horses, Olympic prospects etcetc. But £35,000 for a PONY, for a CHILD?! That can only be for the parents competition desires, surely?! When I was a kid it was all about washing peoples cars to build up enough money to contribute to my pony, mucking in at the stables, water fights, bareback races in the fields and makeshift tack from baler twine.

YES (before aqnyone starts) I'm aware of the cost a horse that was a winning prospect for Badminton, Burghley, has been trained and competed by Mary King will cost, but a CHILDS PONY?! -

I'm considering buying my kid a pony, but as a fun 'hobby' thing to do - much like taking kid to football practice, sunday league etc. Yes we'll do going to shows and pony club and what not, and I'll support him as much as he does, or doesn't, want to do, but still!

I mean, there's no other """""sport""""" like it, is there? Lewis Hamilton wouldn't have had a F1 car bought for him, he grew up on go karts, got the sponsorship. I doubt Andy Murrays tennis racket cost £35,000. Maybe for parents who want to send their child to ballet school - but thats the cost of training, which the 'lucky' child will also get, not for the ballet shoes!

My jaw just dropped, £35,000! For a child! Who in their right mind would think that's sensible, or healthy?!

My cousin once removed events for Sweden and came 7th in the europeans, her pony sold for FAR more than that when she moved onto horses. It's not her parents dream to event for her country but hers, yes she's had the upbringing that's stood her in good stead, and that's what she wants to do for the rest of her life so why wouldn't her parents do everything they could to help her achieve that dream?? They brought her pony on quite a lot but I don't doubt that they will have spent the majority of the money they got for her previous pony on new horses. Obviously we'd all like to go buy a dirt cheap pony that turns into an FEI superstar, but if you've got the money then I don't see why you wouldn't spend it. It's all relevant, 25k to you may be a lot, but to others it may not.