On Wed, 15 Aug 2012 16:20:26 -0400, Dave Smith
> wrote:

>On 15/08/2012 3:26 PM, Brooklyn1 wrote:
>> "graham" wrote:
>>>
>>> An elderly aunt gave me some good advice many years ago: "Never marry a
>>> woman who has horses. The horses will *always* come first!"
>>
>> Auntie wasn't lying... of course woman-horse love is normal... there's
>> good reason for the adage "hung like a horse". heheheh
>>
>
>
>And the male horses that most girls may ride are gelded, so that thing
>is little more than an ornament.
>
>
>The horse riding world is a puzzle. When I was a kid there were a lot of
>westerns, in the movies and on television. They were ridden almost
>exclusively by cowboys and other males, rarely by women.

Dale Evans... many of the westerns from the '50s featured females
riding horses.

>I took up rising in my 50s. The stable were I rode had only two male
>riders, me and another guy who was about 40. There were more than 50
>female students, many of them teens or younger.
>
>When you go to local schooling shows the competitors are almost all
>female. I was usually the only male competing, and there would be 30-40
>females from age 8 to 60. When you get into the regional competitions,
>the male participation increases from less to 5% to maybe 15%. The
>higher you go in the horse show world, the higher the percentage of
>males. When it gets to the international level it is about 2/3 male.

Then why are all jockey's male... and polo players?