Horse Scores
An open letter to the vaulting community:
On page 32 of the FEI Guidelines for Judges, April 2005 4th edition, suspension phase is listed as one of the qualities our vaulting horses are being judged on. As a horse owner, trainer, & longeur I am interested in receiving a detailed description of exactly what suspension is and when it occurs in the cantering horse.
I attended Dr. Marvin Beeman’s, DVM Conformation Form to Function clinic during Nationals in Denver. Dr. Beeman is an internationally acclaimed veterinarian as well as horseman with more than 60 years of experience riding and caring for horses from the back yard horse to Olympic show jumpers and international race horses. In his presentation, he described how various conformation faults affect the horses gaits and ability to stay sound. When he showed us a picture of 4 race horses crossing the finish line and all 4 of them were in suspension (no foot touching the ground), I decided he was the man to explain suspension in the canter to me. During the question answer period of his presentation, I described the controversy in our vaulting discipline about suspension at the canter and asked how he could enlighten me, he simply said: there is no suspension at the canter. So thinking that he perhaps didn’t quite understand my question or I didn’t understand his answer, I went home and using my technologically advanced DVD system, I watched frame by frame almost every horse at Nationals 2005. I couldn’t find one that had my definition of suspension (all 4 feet off the ground at the same time); no draft horses, no thoroughbreds, no warmbloods, and no quarter horses. If I can’t see true suspension, using a frame by frame stop action camera, how is the judge supposed to see it when they are also supposed to be looking at the vaulter (if it even does exist)?
Perhaps my definition must be faulty so I am asking from the judge’s, the FEI or someone to give me the correct definition. It seems only fair that if my horse is going to be judged on something, I need to know as a trainer and longeur what it is.
If what the judge’s are really looking at in suspension is the amount of air time the horse is getting, perhaps we should all put weighted shoes on our horses or grow their hooves very long as in the Saddlebred industry and we’ll all get higher stepping horses. Of course, it might come at the expense of the safety of our vaulters and the soundness of our horses.
In conclusion, I have to ask myself why is suspension an issue at all. Cadence, carriage and submission are the other qualities listed as being important to a vaulting horse.
“- Cadence means a constant number of canter strides throughout the presentation, independent of the length of strides.”
“- Carriage is when the nose line is in front of the vertical and on the poll is the highest point, combined with the engagement of the hind quarters and an active hock action.”
“- Submission is when the horse willingly accepts the longeurs aids.”
These are qualities that are important to the safety of the horse and the vaulter. These qualities also help to enhance the performance of both the horse and the vaulter. According to the FEI rules, lack of a suspension phase limits your horse score to a maximum score of 5. Which makes it very important for us as horse owners, trainers, and longeurs to address this subject.
I would like to think that we are developing reasonable standards for our own industry. We need to look at what is important for a vaulting horse to be good for vaulting and not blindly adopt standards directly from another discipline that doesn’t vault.
Noel Martonovich
On page 32 of the FEI Guidelines for Judges, April 2005 4th edition, suspension phase is listed as one of the qualities our vaulting horses are being judged on. As a horse owner, trainer, & longeur I am interested in receiving a detailed description of exactly what suspension is and when it occurs in the cantering horse.
I attended Dr. Marvin Beeman’s, DVM Conformation Form to Function clinic during Nationals in Denver. Dr. Beeman is an internationally acclaimed veterinarian as well as horseman with more than 60 years of experience riding and caring for horses from the back yard horse to Olympic show jumpers and international race horses. In his presentation, he described how various conformation faults affect the horses gaits and ability to stay sound. When he showed us a picture of 4 race horses crossing the finish line and all 4 of them were in suspension (no foot touching the ground), I decided he was the man to explain suspension in the canter to me. During the question answer period of his presentation, I described the controversy in our vaulting discipline about suspension at the canter and asked how he could enlighten me, he simply said: there is no suspension at the canter. So thinking that he perhaps didn’t quite understand my question or I didn’t understand his answer, I went home and using my technologically advanced DVD system, I watched frame by frame almost every horse at Nationals 2005. I couldn’t find one that had my definition of suspension (all 4 feet off the ground at the same time); no draft horses, no thoroughbreds, no warmbloods, and no quarter horses. If I can’t see true suspension, using a frame by frame stop action camera, how is the judge supposed to see it when they are also supposed to be looking at the vaulter (if it even does exist)?
Perhaps my definition must be faulty so I am asking from the judge’s, the FEI or someone to give me the correct definition. It seems only fair that if my horse is going to be judged on something, I need to know as a trainer and longeur what it is.
If what the judge’s are really looking at in suspension is the amount of air time the horse is getting, perhaps we should all put weighted shoes on our horses or grow their hooves very long as in the Saddlebred industry and we’ll all get higher stepping horses. Of course, it might come at the expense of the safety of our vaulters and the soundness of our horses.
In conclusion, I have to ask myself why is suspension an issue at all. Cadence, carriage and submission are the other qualities listed as being important to a vaulting horse.
“- Cadence means a constant number of canter strides throughout the presentation, independent of the length of strides.”
“- Carriage is when the nose line is in front of the vertical and on the poll is the highest point, combined with the engagement of the hind quarters and an active hock action.”
“- Submission is when the horse willingly accepts the longeurs aids.”
These are qualities that are important to the safety of the horse and the vaulter. These qualities also help to enhance the performance of both the horse and the vaulter. According to the FEI rules, lack of a suspension phase limits your horse score to a maximum score of 5. Which makes it very important for us as horse owners, trainers, and longeurs to address this subject.
I would like to think that we are developing reasonable standards for our own industry. We need to look at what is important for a vaulting horse to be good for vaulting and not blindly adopt standards directly from another discipline that doesn’t vault.
Noel Martonovich
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