# Switching horses in a competition?



## Chiilaa (Aug 12, 2010)

From what I understand, the horse is not judged at any point, the riders are. A good rider should be able to get on any horse and ride them well, maybe not to the best of a horse's abilities straight away, but well enough to show they can.


----------



## MudPaint (Aug 14, 2010)

I've seen this a Washington Int Horse Show... I think it's the call backs for the Eq. class... I could be wrong. It really shows how much work some riders are putting in to get a flawless round.


----------



## LoveTheSaddlebreds (Jul 9, 2009)

I did it when I was on a riding team at finals. In the finale class at finals, we were all made to switch horses. It was pretty interesting.


----------



## DancingArabian (Jul 15, 2011)

I've seen it at gaited horse shows. In one class, it's the horse being judged - the horse is supposed to do the same thing with both riders. People ride in a team - one rider goes first, then the other. Both are asked to do the same thing. In another class, it's the riders being judged, and the riders are not in a team and just seem to somehow randomly swap.


----------



## Dreamcatcher Arabians (Nov 14, 2010)

I haven't seen it recently but it used to be fairly commonplace at horse shows if the judge needed to make a final determination on placings. We were called on to do it in Eq, Pleasure and Hunter Hack but never for Hunter over fences classes.


----------



## xJumperx (Feb 19, 2012)

There is actually a certain team in the Hunter world that pretty much all you do is switch around. Here is how it goes -

You go to the show. This show is held where there are horses avaliable, whom are proven to not be dangerous, though some are more broke than others. You are given a random horse. You watch this horse be ridden for 15 minutes, then you get to ride the horse for 30 minutes yourself. After time is up, you get off the horse, and enter, based on your ability, as well as the horses. If you notice that your horse is not scopey enough to do 3', than you don't compete at that height, even though you may want to.

So you show on this random horse, do as you do, and then your done. After the show, you are showm where the horse is stalled and where his tack goes, and you take care of the horse, etc. People approve of your care skills, and then you leave. 

You switch every show.

Now, I think this is really dumb. There is no year end points, no awards, and it's not really fair. It doesn't show good horsemanship, or how to really practice, and that you get great results from that. It just doesn't have many benefits. Mostly people who don't own horses do this, so that they don't have to limit themselves to schooling shows at their barn, or wait for the barn show team to go somewhere, ask to use a lesson horse, possibly be denied, and not be able to show anyway. So I do see the benefit there.

But personally, I would just stick to runofthemill showing


----------



## Kootenay (Nov 7, 2010)

I believe they made the riders switch horses at the WEG in show jumping last time I watched it. Makes it interesting I guess.

Locally I seem to remember them doing it for the occasional medal class.


----------



## LoveTheSaddlebreds (Jul 9, 2009)

For us, since it was all equitation, they wanted to see that we could both perform well on a familiar horse as well as an unfamiliar one.


----------

