Ella Rak impressed us with her writing ability and fun style so much that she made it to the Final Four of EN’s 2013 Blogger Contest. As with the rest of the finalists, we invited Ella to contribute a weekly piece to the site. Thanks to Ella for writing, and thank you for reading.
From Ella:
As a rising high school senior attempting to finish her college apps before the dreaded return to school, I have been thinking a lot more about numbers lately and how they relate to everything. In the absurd crap shoot they call college admissions, numbers are everything, but does this really make you a “good” student? Of course, this led me to ponder if this same predicament applies to eventing — a game that when you think about it is really a numbers game.
Does a horse that can win an event truly represent the ideal eventing horse? The current scoring system eerily resembles much of what I have seen of college applications — drastically different weighting on each section, changing from level to level and school to school. An event, like college applications, is essentially a really hard equation, and you have to manipulate the variables you can to the best of your ability.
At the lower levels of eventing, dressage has a much more significant weight than the other phases, and a half point can make the difference between first and third — the constants of your equation. Your dressage score is your limit — the lowest score you can get — and once you take that first step, the variables you can change are greatly limited.
I was watching some very large divisions this weekends, and when you have 20-plus horses in a division, it perplexes me as to how the numbers correspond to differences in a horse’s performance. But we aren’t hunters, and every movement you make has a value attached; if you can figure out what those numbers mean and how to change them, you are golden. Your horse comes into the arena with a certain max potential; some horses even with the best riders in the world may never get into the teens, while others may have won the genetic lottery.
Once your constants and initial equation have been established in dressage, show jumping can start to balance it all out. Rails, stops and time can add up in a big equation or division, but a four-point penalty can sometimes be fixable by moving some numbers around in the final phase — an extra kick or pushing for just a little faster phase. Keeping check of your signs — both positive and negative — can change the outcome of the problem, but a half-second mistake can tweak the outcome in the end.
When walking your show jumping course and trying to convert steps to feet, feet to strides, and strides to a riding approach, you are doing a math problem: taking the data given and drawing a conclusion. Every jump is a function you have to solve — adding or subtracting strides, changing arc, angle or velocity. If you solve it right through any of many different methods, you end up with the right answer. This all sets you up for the big reworking of the problem in cross country, and if you can get it right, everything fits into place.
Cross country is the big fish to fry — the factoring of the equation. You mess up your math here and it can be back to the drawing board to re-approach the problem. All your set up in the previous phases — rhythm, straightness, impulsion — come to play multiplied, and snoozing during math class can come back to bite you in the butt. A stop will almost always knock you out of the ribbons, while time can multiply fast. These problems can be cumulative or in one big swoop, but either way you are getting farther from having your equation equal a blue ribbon.
As you run through the fields, you are striving to make it within time, to not add numbers, all the while balancing the two to maximize your potential. When you cross that finish line, you’ve submitted your final answer, and all variables have been eliminated, leaving only the work you produced with a number attached. With the right variables, the right working and a little bit of luck, the equation will work out in your favor, but sometimes even your best performances — and the most brilliant mathematicians — can’t make up for variables out of your control.
So as you load up the trailer on the way to your next event, think about the monster you are about to face. All your practice is about to add up, to solve where the pair fits in, hopefully with the answer you desire (and now you understand why I have been accused of over thinking my riding …). Bring your calculator and thinking hat along, because all that said, eventing can be like some rational functions — the limits don’t exist.
