Interesting. When we bought our condo part of the “package” was our choice of carpet (way back then hardwood was not a choice and we couldn’t afford an upgrade). Our stairs were carpeted, too. I slipped probably at least three times on the stairs during those years, and thankfully was young enough at the time that there was no real injury.
Since we remodelled 18 years ago we have all hardwood including the stairs, and I’ve never slipped once. I wonder if it was the carpet that encouraged the previous falls. (?)
I’m blind in my left eye, and I have a pretty severe right foot drop from some spinal surgery back in 1976. Between the foot drop and the lack of depth perception it would be kind of astonishing if I didn’t take a tumble once in a while.
So far, a fall has only sent me to the emergency room once, and urgent care could have handled it, had I been able to find one that was open
I hope you wear a helmet. More adults die in riding accidents than kids, in no small part because kids are more likely to wear helmets. One source I consulted when writing about helmets noted that riding is more dangerous than football since if you fall from the horse you are falling a lot further.
My daughter rode hunter jumpers, so I spent a lot of time worrying during shows.
I’ve heard that often, but we don’t wear/own helmets. Our horses are sweethearts and we are both competent riders. Honestly, if I get thrown I’m not sure I wanna survive given the other injuries I’m likely to experience.
I have 50 years of riding experience. Never thrown involuntarily. Did have a horse fall on a muddy hill and roll onto his side. When my daughter rode and took lessons, a helmet was required.
I know an entirely competent rider who’s alive because she was wearing a helmet. She kept the helmet, and once showed it to me. The huge dent in it would have been in her head.
She did have other injuries; but they were all the sort that heal, and they did so.
Yep, everything’s fine, until it isn’t. Same for motorcyclists, bicyclists, drivers, pilots. I had a seizure while raking my front lawn - never happened before, so far hasn’t happened since, but had it happened while driving, who knows what havoc it might have wrought.
The statistics are similar with bicycles also. And motorcycles.
Did you realize that before helmets football players protected their heads by growing their hair very long. And it took quite a while for helmets to get adopted for hockey - they let older players not wear them while rookies had to.
My daughter’s horse was a sweetheart also, and she became captain of her college riding team. But the horse got spooked by another horse, not while competing of course, and she got thrown. No injuries at least. I’m glad she rode English, not Western.
We rode on a trail in Alaska. The issue there weren’t the horses, but the potential for bears.
But mostly, the statistics speak for themselves.
I think a traditional pile carpet just doesn’t offer all that much friction (compared with the force of a foot coming down, and possibly with a litlte built-in slide due to your gait) - especially once it’s compressed a bit.
Pure hardwood would pose its own dangers, especially if I were wearing socks. Then, it would be not so much “when I fall” as “how many times will I fall in the first week?”. Though I pretty much never go around in stocking feet in the house; virtually always barefoot at home.
In any case, I do feel MUCH more secure with the berber. Aside from the day where I got so lightheaded that I stumbled on standing (nowhere near the stairs, luckily), I have not fallen since the work was done.