Equestrian Eventing Essay

Assignment 2: Guided Critical Review
Equestrian Eventing: The Olympics Most Dangerous Sport?
Cooke, Sonia. "Equestrian Eventing: The Olympics’ Most Dangerous Sport? | TIME.Com". TIME.com. N.p., 2016. Web. 4 May 2016.
Topic
Whilst most riders completely disregard the inherent dangers of Eventing, many others riders and people outside of the equine world are beginning to question whether Eventing truly is the most dangerous still being competed at the Olympics.
Content
This article is about Equine Eventing being classed as the most dangerous sport in the Olympics. Eventing consists of three stages, Dressage, Show Jumping, and Cross-Country and is often referred to as the triathlon of the equine world, with Cross-Country being the hardest, most

Rhetorical Function
The way in which the author has gained the audience’s attention and maintained it is through presenting the facts of Eventing, including the fall rates and the deaths that occur through these falls to both horse and rider. The author has also presented the findings that there are safety measures that can be put in place, but due to the cost and the FEI’s unwillingness to change the rules, they are not being implemented. This method of writing is Pathos, the author is using the audience’s emotions to drive the message home and get the desired reaction.
Purpose
The purpose of the article is to provide the audience with the reality of Eventing: It is an incredibly dangerous sport that requires its competitors to take their life and that of their horse in their hands, “Walking away and being able to say ‘Thank God nobody died,’ isn’t good enough”. The author also brings to light the creation of jump safety devices such as ‘Frangible Pins’ and ‘Deformable Foam Logs’ that are not being used due to cost, and ‘Air Vests’ that riders are required to

By doing this the author makes the audience question just how much they know about the sport; how many horse and rider deaths occur each year, how many of those are a direct result of a rotational fall, how many of those could have been prevented by the use of the proposed safety measures, the author does this by presenting facts and information from committees and the FEI.
Position
The author is coming from a factual and knowledgeable position. From the way the views and quotes of the participants of the article are placed, to the information about jump safety components, to the number of horses and riders that are killed every year as a direct result of Eventing. The author is also quite clear in that no one is calling for the sport to be banned, she is merely calling to have simple safety features made mandatory for all Events.
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