The one about the Olympic Games 2024

The thing with horses is the difference in perception of care between what the general public who’ve never even seen a horse in real life and those who’ve actually kept or work with horses.

Coming from a horse background myself (and my daughter works as a groom for an event rider) I’d be amazed if Dujardin was abusing a horse. It doesn’t sit with her style or the dressage world.

As humans we control every animal we have domesticated and 600kg of pure muscle like a top horse takes a lot more to control than a Jack Russell.

But until the video is in the public domain no one can judge.

I’d be amazed if Dujardin was abusing a horse.

enough to get her a 6 month ban from the international governing body ?‍♂️. I have no doubt plenty of “horsey” people would consider it perfectly acceptable behaviour though.

Snoop Dogg to carry Olympic flame – admittedly just as part of the relay but what the heck!

https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/articles/clkyjlm97p3o

Are we sure the massive cone shaped thing with one end on fire he’ll be carrying is the Olympic Torch?

The Olympics has an ability to create memories. I can remember the Rocket Man from La 84 when I would have been ten! Steve Redgrave winning his 5th gold medal watching it on a tiny tv in a rubbish hotel.

My wife worked at the Horse events at 2012 for both the Olympics and Paralympics and the feeling in London at that time was amazing. I managed to get some athletics and Judo tickets and had a greta time watching it. However kind of gave up on trying to get tickets for Paris as seemed just too expensive.

Will still enjoy watching it

enough to get her a 6 month ban from the international governing body ?‍

She’s not been banned, she’s been suspended while the incident is investigated.

It appears she crossed the line and it’s been caught on film. I’m more curious as to who and why it’s been leaked right before her chance to break the female medal record.

Allegedly a Dutch lawyer submitted said video, not wanting her to be winning Medals whilst conducting herself in this manner…  4 years ago.

The video was taken during a lesson charlotte was teaching in the Netherlands.

The official complaint included a video which shows Dujardin “beating the horse excessively with a whip. This not only breaches FEI regulations, but can also be considered a very serious form of animal cruelty,” the lawyer stated.

The video has not been made public.

The video is almost one minute in length and shows Dujardin on the ground, training a rider on a horse in canter. With a cracking lunge whip she is hitting the horse against its legs and hindquarters. Approximately 23 lashes can be counted within the time frame of the clip.

https://www.eurodressage.com/2024/07/23/dressage-icon-charlotte-dujardin-toppled-horse-abuse-allegations

Just a momentary lapse in judgement…to allow her cruel nature to be captured on film.

Coming from a horse background myself (and my daughter works as a groom for an event rider) I’d be amazed if Dujardin was abusing a horse. It doesn’t sit with her style or the dressage world.

We’ve got two horses (rescue animals, not ridden these days, though my wife has in the past). Whipping a horse 24 times in a minute so that it’d lift it’s legs up higher….yep no abuse there. It’s the none horse folk that just don’t understand.

As humans we control every animal we have domesticated and 600kg of pure muscle like a top horse takes a lot more to control than a Jack Russell.

As Princess Anne discovered to her cost, almost certainly smacked in the face by a horse suddenly swinging its head sideways – in a horse/human interaction of that nature, it’s guaranteed the human comes off second best!

ITV have got the video of the lovely woman whipping the horse.

I’m not sure she’ll be going to any more Olympics, after that.

Just saw the video on ITV.

That’s not the video that was shared previously.

Outright wrong.

Good riddance.

(Still disagree with the timing of this.  Should have been dealt with at the time)

Coming from a horse background myself (and my daughter works as a groom for an event rider) I’d be amazed if Dujardin was abusing a horse. It doesn’t sit with her style or the dressage world.

this comment aged well!

I don’t believe for a second this was a one-off. Watch the video, she’s super relaxed about it (you can hear laughter). This is standard practise.

Relying on a horse for your medals is a bit wrong, imo.

yeah not sure equestrians should be in the olympics.  completely uneven playing field, immensely privileged people due to a huge cost associated with entry.

But I’ve seen the video.  It doesn’t look like a momentary lack of judgement.  That would suggest some kind of anger/frustration towards the horse but her behaviour was fairly calm while smashing the horse with the whip and suggests that it was fairly normal behaviour for her.

It’s not really a surprise given some horse owners and dressage riders that we see.

beating the horse excessively with a whip

What’s the acceptable amount of horse whipping?

What’s the acceptable amount of horse whipping?

Don’t over-whip it – once it just reaches stiff peaks, then stop

It appears she crossed the line and it’s been caught on film. I’m more curious as to who and why it’s been leaked right before her chance to break the female medal record.

It’s either tactical, or someones just pissed off hearing how great she is and generally having smoke blown up her arse. No doubt the outcome of the investigation will be the same as the one recently where the woman was caught punching her horse in the face ( and as in the response above – which was hopefully tongue in cheek )

 Whipping a horse 24 times in a minute so that it’d lift it’s legs up higher….yep no abuse there. It’s the none horse folk that just don’t understand.

To clarify, yes tongue in cheek. Just seen the video. Let’s not postulate on the motivations behind the timing of the perk. Let’s challenge this ‘momentary’ lapse of judgement narrative. I call bollocks. No way is it the first time that she’s acted like that, and it’s safe to assume that it’s widespread within equestrian events. Absolutely vile and blood sports should be removed from the Olympics.

Reminds me of that video from a couple of years back where the horsey toff was beating a horse with a tree branch, and all his horsey toff mates were standing around laughing and cheering. It’s obvious that for a certain set, this is not only acceptable, but the correct way to treat an animal.

Heard someone from Horse and Hound magazine on the radio earlier whose main concern seemed to be the motivations of the whistleblower and how they had ruined the Olympic team, and that the British public ‘needed to be educated’ on the training methods necessary for success in dressage.

I suspect that the British public being educated further on the training methods being used behind closed doors would have the opposite effect to the one she wants. I’d rather not have the medals, thanks.

I imagine giving our track and field team a damn good thrashing would up our medal tally significantly. I can’t believe we haven’t tried it, I mean there must be incremental gains to be had switching from plane whips to a cat’ o Ninetails, and I don’t even know anything about it

Hitting animals? Just no

and that the British public ‘needed to be educated’ on the training methods necessary for success in dressage.

The training methods necessary for success in dressage.

Dressage is a totally unnecessary pursuit in the first place so no “training methods” are necessary especially if these are indicative of the methods used.

To be honest, and I am certain everyone would agree, we swap out dressage for sheep dog trials.

As soon as you involve animals (or children, in the case of sports such as gymnastics and swimming, given the age at which training begins), the vulnerability means that training methods, physical and psychological, need to be monitored closely.

If you need to torment a horse or a child to achieve ‘excellence’, that sport should not exist.

I imagine giving our track and field team a damn good thrashing would up our medal tally significantly. I can’t believe we haven’t tried it

I believe the Chinese had similar training methods for their gymnasts. Allegedly ?

Heard someone from Horse and Hound magazine on the radio earlier

I think that was the same interview that I listened to, and I had a similar reaction. What she also said is that the FEI ‘ should have sat on it till after the olympics’ or word to that effect because of the timing. Hmmm

Not ruining the planet through climate change and biodiversity loss is always a good ball park!

On that basis there will never be a green anything. This Olympics maybe less harmful as I understand they are using a much higher proportion of existing venues rather than building everything new. Even in the narrow assessment of the games it will be heavily populated

I think that was the same interview that I listened to, and I had a similar reaction.

Were you shouting ‘**** off!’ at the radio too?

the British public ‘needed to be educated’ on the training methods being used behind closed doors

People that mistreat animals, in normal life or in the pursuit of ‘sporting excellence’ could probably do with a bit of behind closed doors education of their own.

In the words of the late Brian Clough*

* slight tenuous given he used to whack his players with a squash racket and make them run around in the nettles for getting things wrong.

So I have just seen the video – it seems excessive compared to how I have ever seen a horse being trained (daughter has a horse and does a bit of dressage, jumping, cross country etc with weekly lessons), but, to be honest, it wasn’t actually as bad as I thought it would be given the outcry – even after stricter controls were brought in over excessive whipping in horse racing, the way jockeys whip their horses is often far, far worse.

even after stricter controls were brought in over excessive whipping in horse racing, the way jockeys whip their horses is often far, far worse.

Apparently the dressage whips are thinner and are designed cause more pain than the whips the jockeys are still (inexplicably) allowed to use.

I’m interested in what is seen as ‘normal practice’ in training, if 20+ strikes with a whip in a minute is excessive.

Apparently the dressage whips are thinner and are designed

I did wonder about that – are they essentially the same as lunge whips or are they different? From what I can see, it looks like a lunge whip but I am by no means an expert. TBF, I don’t recall any dressage tutors using a whip of any kind when watching my daughter in training.

Thinking about it more, the whip in the video was being used on the legs (which I have *never* seen) rather than the rump as is the case with horse racing so I guess it must hurt more.

@martinhutch

No that’s not normal at all.

The dressage whip normally used whilst on the horse should be used to touch rather than whip.  It’s a reminder tool rather than a punish tool.  Negative reinforcement is a very out dated practice.

I did wonder about that – are they essentially the same as lunge whips or are they different? From what I can see, it looks like a lunge whip but I am by no means an expert

Someone on the radio earlier, who appeared to be knowledgeable, said it was a lunge whip

Personally, I’d like to see her prosecuted for animal cruelty.  Like others have said, I’m extremely sceptical that this was a one off  “lapse of judgement”

In case anyone’s interested in cycling – the TT and RR courses are on Strava:

https://stories.strava.com/articles/paris-2024-road-cycling-routes-strava

The dressage whip normally used whilst on the horse should be used to touch rather than whip. 

Yeah – that’s how we usually use the (lunge) whip (when lunging our horse) – I can imagine there will be quite a bit of force through one of those – they are about 1.5m long. But I have seen some tutors encourage some pretty hard whipping (ie, telling the person on the horse to whip the rump, not beating the horse with a lunge whip) if horses aren’t doing as they are being told (usually this is when they are refusing a jump).

yeah not sure equestrians should be in the olympics.  completely uneven playing field, immensely privileged people due to a huge cost associated with entry.

Doesn’t this apply to pretty much any sport that relies on equipment? Boats, bikes, bows and arrows (I’m guessing that they aren’t cheap)? But anyone can run, so that must be fine, although can poorer nations afford the expensive footwear that rich nations can? That’s without thinking about nutrition, training regimes, the cost of good coaching, the huge amounts of drugs necessary ( :D ).

You know, I’m not sure that the Olympics, as a whole, is an even playing field.

Having said that, very tongue in cheek, I’ve watched a bunch of Kenyan Olympic-standard runners go past me in a marathon at twice my speed. Barefoot. They didn’t need any equipment!

if horses aren’t doing as they are being told

Do you speak horse?

I’m confident that nobody gets into horse riding because they hate animals, but surely by the time you get to the point where you’re hitting them to achieve whatever it is you’re after perhaps the overall activity should be questioned?

I guess it’s just been fully normalised though. I bet you don’t get dog owners whipping their animals through Crufts or whatever their local equivalent is.