Those of you who know me from real life will remember a horse called Pria. Those of you who have joined the journey since we started vlogging won’t have met her. So Pria is now a 14yo arab from Halsdon Arabians. I went down to Devon to pick her up when she was 5 and we made it all the way to 1* FEI.
We were ready to take her to her first 2* when training had really plateaued, she wasn’t muscling up the way she should be with the amount of training she was doing so our Physio recommended taking her for a bit of an MOT with the vets before our race. She wasn’t lame, she didn’t seem to be in pain, the only real ‘symptom’ would be stiffness after any canter work and the lack of muscle development.
It turned out she had some issues with her bones, at 16.1hh she was very tall and had very long legs for an arab. She also had some issues with her SIJ’s. I gave her a year off to recover, to mature (she was 8 at the time) and chill out. I then bought her back into work a year later, we did a 64km ride and she passed with flying colours. But the vets had told me that with hard, intense work her bony issues were likely to come back and that she was at a high risk of stress fractures and would need constant assessment.
I just wasn’t willing to continue to train and compete her at a level that could potentially break her. Now I know that elite athletes are always on the cusp of injury, balancing along that fine line between performance and breakdown. But when it comes to horses, for me anyway, if they are struggling as they get up to the top of the sport I don’t want to push them just to achieve my goals and potentially put them at risk, especially when I already know it’s more likely.
So rather than walk that knife edge and always wonder if I was doing the right thing by continuing Pria on her FEI career I decided to sell her. Pria landed well and truly on all four hooves as she is now with the most wonderful owner who couldn’t love her more if she tried and Pria is most definitely happy being treated like the Princess she always knew she was.
So since then Sara, Pria’s new owner, and I have tried to meet up and go for a ride every year. Tissy and Pria always recognise each other and have a good whicker and squeal. And although letting go of a horse always breaks my heart, and it’s bitter sweet seeing them again, we have a lovely time catching up on the horses and it’s so nice to see Pria loving life and giving someone else so much joy.
Beth Endurance 