For those of you who, like me are involved in eventing or follow it, you know, like all horse sports, it has a lot of risk involved.  The past two years have been especially bad (we seem to be on a ten year cycle with accident strings!) and there have been, and continue to be a lot of rule changes to make the sport as safe as possible, especially above Training Level, where these accidents seem to be occuring.

 At Red Hills in FL this past weekend, tragedy struck all in one day.

Two horses died on course in XC, both of heart attacks.  Johnathan Holling's horse, Direct Merger, and a young rider's (Missy Martin?) horse, Leprechaun's Rowdy Boy.

Darren Chiacchia, one of our top riders who has been amazing in promoting and giving back to our sport, suffered a severe rotational fall with one of his greenies, Baron Verdi.  Horse has recovered fully from some bruising and is fine.  Darren was critically injured and airlifted.  He remains unconscious and is back on a ventilator in the ICU with a severe head injury, two bruised lungs, one partially collapsed lung, and multiple rib fractures.  Status updates from his family can be found at eventrider.com and donations to an emergency fund as well as good wishes can be sent through that site.

 The president of USEA has also released a letter which can be read at useventing.com.  The event organizers at Red Hill did a fabulous job handling all this and are no doubt, grief-stricken, as all of us are, about the horrible chain of events at their facility.  Please keep Darren, Johnathan, Missy, and their families in your thoughts and prayers this week.

Omg that's horrible! Darren is one of my favorite riders to follow.  I will be thinking of all of them.  Thanks for the update... I don't have time to stay updated lately!

He is one of my favourites as well.  Last time I saw him at Rolex in 06, he was competing Windfall -- one of the moments I really respected him for was on the XC, right as he came up next to us, he pulled the stallion up (who had looked fine to me and I couldn't figure it out) and just walked off course.  Turned out, Windfall had a sore ankle, Darren felt it, and pulled him immediately, even though their dressage test was BRILLIANT and they scored in the 20's.  I loved that "horse-first" decision and ever since have continued to be impressed by him.  I am just praying daily that he wakes up soon!

There really aren't words to describe how sorry I am for Jon and Missy.  Losing your partner is something that no one should ever have to go through.  I guess the only silver lining here is that they were not physically injured in the accidents...they are absolutely in my thoughts.

As for Darren, he is not one of my favorite riders in the world, but the fall he too was brutal.  He and his family are in my thoughts and I hope to see him back in the saddle some day.  I truly hope he will wake up and recover to at least ride again.   

  I had heard about Darren, but didn't know it was that bad.  My prayers are with him, his family and the families of those who have lost horses.  Eventing isn't easy, it's not supposed to be, let's keep our fingers crossed that these accidents start to really happen less often.

WOW!  Breaks my heart and I will be praying for Darren and the others.  I just met him on New Years....

Oh dear, how sad..

I hope Darren recovers fully.. I haven't done any eventing, and although it looks like fun to gallop across the terrain and jump obstacles, I watch those competing with my heart in my throat.

That is so sad :( Prayers for all involved

Jessi

Update:  Darren has opened his eyes a few times and can respond to verbal stimuli and it is hoped he will be strong enough to come off the ventilator this week, for those of you who were curious.  He is certainly lucky to be alive after such a brutal fall and I hope he is able to recover and ride again.  These events remind us (or at least me) how vulnerable we really can be -- ok, maybe not you, CheyAut, I don't think your minis will crush you, at least!  Ride safe, everyone! 

Good news!!!

LOL Maybe the minis won't crush me, but what about Radi???! ;)

Jessi

  I was reading some articles (the one on Equisearch's front page was just one of them) about Darren's accident.  Interestingly enough people were making comments about his lack of full insurance.  I know when I did my one and only rated Prelim, (did a few unrated till my horse just couldn't do it anymore) my insurance company had the Kahuna's to call me and inform me that they would not cover me if I had a bad fall (required more than a day of hospitalization and surgery).  I dropped that insurance company and was able to go through another that one of my horses is insured through, YES its EXPENSIVE, but worth every penny.  If it wasn't for them my back would have kept me from riding after the age of 12 when I had my bad fall.  I'm just curious to know if Darren had a similiar problem with his insurance?  Makes you wonder?

Wow, I was not aware that he lacked full insurance although that explains why they set up the emergency fund, I was wondering about that.  I am impressed that your old company called you ahead of time to inform you of your lack of coverage. 

Hmm CheyAut, yes, Radi can definitely squish you!  There is a very interesting conversation going on on our USEA area II server between all the folks who have been competeing at these higher level for a while (and I mean higher than me at BN/Novice.  Since we lost the long format events in the desperation of USEF/USEA to stay in the Olympics and chase medals (and $$), our XC courses have changed dramatically.  Used to be the jumps would fit in with a gallop stride and horses would land galloping.  If you fall at speed, you are usually thrown clear of the horse (not always, but generally).  Now, XC is becoming increasingly technical and the jumps are set up like SJ jumps and the horses are sucked back and when they fall, you are right under them and the horse can do nothing to avoid you because it doesn't have the momentum.  Very interesting and worth considering for folks who want to move up in the eventing levels.  Of course not many top riders want to see the long format comeback b/c then they couldn't go play at the Olympics anymore, so probably the rest of us are out of luck.

Well, the change came about maybe 10 years ago?  Many reasons were stated, one excuse was land/space demands (although most events especially high level are on established properties that have no land threats i.e. KY Horse Park, Badminton, Burghley...).  I think that was one of the primary reasons of the Olympic format change?  At the time, USEA promised that the short format would be ONLY for the Olympics, but well, we've seen that that is not the case.  There was no real fight to keep the long format by any of the administration and I can remember that riders were instructed, pretty much, to just deal with b/c that was "the way things are going."  

Some blame WB folks clamoring to proliferate the short format so their horses could be competitive against the TB's which excel at traditional format eventing.  Valid or not, I have no way of knowing.  But the short format XC courses are proving very harmful to horses with the fast/slow/fast/slow/fast/slow pace that stresses the cardiovascular system much more than just fast.....   I hope that our executive folks can see that and do something real about it.

At my personal eventing level it doesn't matter, but for the sport as a whole, it's been very harmful and while people have always gotten hurt jumping horses, we're seeing much more horse/rider deaths and terrible injuries as the short format becomes established across the board in the last 10 years or so.

  I was very lucky to ride a friends horse (that had done Intermediate) at the one big Prelim I did (a one star) and I can say it was VERY demanding and very difficult, that was over 10 yrs ago.  Yes, it had the steeplechase (but since it was a one star it wasn't too long), but there were fewer injuries to both horse and rider.  I think the problem with the short format is some TB's (most that I know of) are so naturally game to really gallop and jump, the short is soo much more technical that I have seen increasingly more falls and injuries related to stress (i.e. fractures, tendons bowing etc) than in the old days.  Maybe we shouldn't bring the long format back, but I agree there should be some "rules" regarding techincality (is that a word?) of some jumps.  Just a few weeks ago I went over to GA to watch an event and I was floored how difficult even the Training was, many injuries, riders were pulling up and the horses never really got "warmed up" if you know what I mean.  The Advanced level riders are really hurting the most, they have these tremendously powerful athletes that were born to literally run long distances and jump for the 3miles, and now sure same length, but they have to shorten, collect then stretch back out.  Very difficult on any horse!  I made the decision a while back just to stay at Novice level until I see some issues that I don't like ironed out.  I know that there will never be a format that will make everyone and every horse happy, but I'm hoping there will be some sort of compromise.  I do; however, really appreciate the care that goes into these shows and being able to have the emergency care available for not only riders, but horses as well.  I know I have been nervously twitching my fingers awaiting the changes.