Horse people. What do you think of Roy Moore’s riding ability?
Will someone please link him leaving the polls yesterday on his horse Sassy. #Free Sassy
I’m no horse person but I though the horse looked too small.
What kind of he-man rides an underage female horse?
Oh…
Man, there is just something wrong with that guy. Who the fuck does that?
I’ve had horses for most of my life. Moore rides horribly. The bit was adjusted too low in poor Sassy’s mouth so that when he yanked on a rein, she tossed her head because it hurt (the joint of the bit was poking her in the roof of the mouth*). He shouldn’t have been yanking on the reins anyway; That bit was designed for one-handed riding which is more about shifting weight than having direct contact with the horse’s mouth. He should’ve used a much milder bit designed for two-handed riding called a snaffle. The strap going under her throat was WAY too tight! That’s called a throatlatch.
His butt shouldn’t have been leaving the saddle. You can see at times he’s almost standing up and then he slams back down onto Sassy’s back. It’s called having a bad seat. The whole disaster demonstrates what a kind horse Sassy is because she should’ve dumped his ass, but she never even came close. From the pictures of her tied up (never tie a horse by the reins), she looks very unhappy. Her eyes should be relaxed and calm, but she looks worried and tense.
- For horse people, from the close-ups I’ve seen the bit looks like a nutcracker Tom Thumb. It’s clear the two shanks move independently, so it’s not just a curb.
I’m no horse person, but he looked really uncoordinated and clumsy. Like you don’t use the reigns to keep your balance and aren’t you supposed to have some of your own weight on the stirrups?
He basically looked like a bag of flour plopped into the saddle.
I haven’t ridden for at least 40 years but it was pretty obvious he’s not an experienced.
Sassy looked mad and was tossing her head around. He had not ridden for a while. IMO. The bit/bridle thing looked wrong.
It was a very stupid thing for him to do.
The answer is that Moore doesn’t ride. Yes, he was on a horse but he clearly had no idea what he was doing. And it was obvious that he hadn’t watched enough Westerns to even fake that he knew how to ride at a walk. Seriously, tourists on a beach ride do a better job of not tormenting the horse.
Just so long as he rides well enough to go off into the sunset…
I’ve seen better riders in front of KMart.
He’s too heavy handed. He’s not using his legs at all, and the two handed reigning is weird. Has he ever ridden that particular mare before?
ETA: I ride occasionally, and I’d be willing to bet the pink slip to my car that I could ride “Sassy” better bareback with a hackamore than he rode in the video, even allowing for crowd induced panic.
Would this be considered animal abuse? #FreeSassy
His horseriding is shit. The man has no skill and I feel sorry for the horse.
I don’t know jack about horseback riding, but I’m reminded of one of my favorite insults from Blackadder. In the middle of a litany of insults, Blackadder tells Prince George, “You ride a horse slightly less well than another horse would” (from memory; I’m probably garbling it a little).
What an interesting post. I don’t know anything about horses, but I admire those of you who do. Just came to say that. 
Another horse rider here. The use of the reins really sticks out to me. This kind of bit works with both reins together, and you move them side to side. Think of every western you’ve ever seen. The horse has probably been trained that way as well. He’s separated them, and has them yanked way out to the side. She’s getting confusing signals (left, no right, LEFT, RIGHT). Worse, he is using them as a balance aid, as someone noted. Imagine someone standing behind you, with terrible balance, and every time they almost fell, they yanked on a rope threaded into your mouth. Reins are there to provide subtle direction cues. They are not balance aids. If you must, that is what the big honking horn on the front of your saddle is for.
Hopefully this loss will keep him away from horses for a long, long time.
In the linked video, the horse appears nervous with all of the asshole press photographers crowding around and snapping pictures. Might have been a new experience for the horse? Yesterday, several news media outlets showed videos taken earlier where people were repeatedly warning the ignorant press people to back away from the horse. I half expected at least one photog to receive a kick to their body, or head.
I wonder how a horse person would compare Moore’s horse handling when he was arriving at the polling station with a calm horse, vs Moore’s horse handling when he was trying to ride a nervous horse thru the clicking, crowding, media-types?
Naming the horse “Sassy” would seem to speak to his attitude about any female.
So, Moore could not possibly have forseen that there might be media waiting at the polling station? Why the hell couldn’t he just drive to the polling station like anyone else? For that matter, how do we know his people didn’t announce his little stunt to the media in advance?
I wasn’t aware that the term “sassy” only applied to females?
*sassy
adjective [ -er/-est only ] us /ˈsæs·i/
rude but not seriously offensive:
I was a sassy kid who sometimes talked back to my mother.*
Maybe you could critique Moore’s horse handling, or riding style?