Re; my post on 'doing XC when the sun is low'; Sherelle Duke.

seabiscuit

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One of the reasons why I put that post up was because it was interesting to see that Sherelle did her XC round at Brockenhurst at 5.47 pm.
Now they dont always run on time. It could have been after 6 pm that she went XC, especially if they had had a few delays on the XC throughout the day which is always likely.
An awful thought and I hate to suggest that it might have been the sun/lighting.
 

Bossanova

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Not a nice thought at all- does anyone know what fence she fell at?
All the uprighty ones had pins, I'd hazard a guess at the skinny coming out of the combination after the double of corners- can see that being a bit of a tricky one in poor light.
 

tigers_eye

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It was at one of the road crossings, I think the one of hanging logs within the first 10 fences. I don't know what angle the sun would have been at at that time. Tbh I have jumped when the sun is low and even when I can't see a damn thing the horses always seem to cope. Their vision is built very differently than ours.
 

Bossanova

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Oh sh*t- maybe at the first and the light was funny on the dark bit of road so he put brakes on mid-takeoff?They were just hanging logs... urghhh makes me shudder
 

tigers_eye

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Do you think the "roll cage" on the woof wear body protactors would make difference in a rotational fall? I know that's what the marketing suggests but do you really think they could make the crucial difference between life and death with the impact of a 500kg horse and all the g forces?
 

Bossanova

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Possibly, but I really doubt it- My sister got flipped over with in the advanced at Hartpury a few years ago, a bounce into water- the horse dropped the whole way down onto her and smashed her leg to smithereens. God knows how anything could protect you from those kind of forces
frown.gif
 

sea_view

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Just read what happened, terrible loss and really makes you think how serious our sport can be no matter what prep you do.

With regards to Woof Wear BP with technology improving all the time I presume, this kind of protection would certainly help but If something of that size/weight falls on you at an awkward angle no amount of protection is likely to help.

Be safe peeps!
 

MissDeMeena

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Funny, i was thinking of getting the exact same thing today!!

It would surely help a bit, and i'm guessing in a case like that, that every bit helps!!!!!
My aunt is a Dr, and says alot of these crushing falls that result in death are to that area!!
 

seabiscuit

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I think there will always be more of a risk going later in the day, There has got to be. Yes 95% of the time, the horse can work out what it is doing amongst the shades and shadows.But there are minute changes in the light reflections/shades every split second and perhaps during a split second the light can be causing a particular shade that just blinds everything momentarily.

But on the other hand, so many other things can go wrong!
 

Rambo

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It only takes one moments hesitation, or one crossed wire...any time of the day or evening
frown.gif
A body protector may help...particularly the 'body cages', but at the the end of the day, if your time is up there's nothing that will save you.......

A tragic event, and our thoughts go out to everyone who knew her, and everyone else involved in the sport. Life really is too short.
 

lifeslemons

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I hate to go into the details but I she broke her neck, so in this case the Woof Wear Body "Cage" would not have helped. I was always under the impression that when marketed and sold, the body protectors came with the warning that they will only absorb some of the damage, but will not prevent it from happening completly. My thought is that when 3/4s of a ton of horse comes down on you, unless you are wearing a concrete block nothing is going to protect you.

With regards to where she fell, (a fence out the sunken road) i suggest that she was perhaps lacking impulsion from the previous 3 efforts in the combination, and that the horse's momentum carried him forwards over it. If this were the case, it would be almost exactly the same as Simon Long's tragic fall at the Sunken Water at Burghley in '99. Same fence too.
 

Bossanova

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It wasnt a true sunken road- more a road crossing with a hanging log, slope down, slope up and another hanging log. I woud imagine he just lost energy up the slope and didnt quite make the log.
 
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