Dutch Times is on the mend

It started out as the ride of a lifetime around a top-level cross-country course at last month’s MARS Maryland Fair Hill event.

Arielle Aharoni, at age 23, was in her first 5-star competition on Dutch Times, a horse her mother, Christina, had bought as a weanling.

Now 15, Dutch had developed into a superb athlete who won show jumping classes, but whose heart was really in eventing. He finished second in June’s 4-star Long at the Bromont event in Canada, so a 5-star was the logical next step.

The Maryland course laid out by renowned Scottish designer Ian Stark had been upgraded in his third year on the job. The optimum time was tight (only one of the competitors would be able to beat the clock) and the hilly terrain posed its own challenge, That was in addition to the various tests ranging from a sunken road to the Crab Water with a beady-eyed replica of the crustacean as one of the elements.

When Arielle neared the end of the 28-obstacle course, Dutch continued to cover ground as if he owned it.

“It was kind of a perfect round. I never felt him get tired,” she recalled.

“He was dragging me around. There was nothing he could have done any better. He never said no.”

Then they reached what Arielle called, “the last really difficult combination,” the Fair Hill Roller-Coaster and Drop. It was so close to the end that from the next fence, the Table, number 26, “you could literally see the finish flags.”

But as Dutch negotiated the Drop, “on landing, he never put his right front down, that was pretty terrifying, it was downhill, he was at full speed on three legs,” Arielle remembered.

“It took forever to pull him up, you know, gravity; you’re going straight down a hill. I’m in distress. I’m crying, pulling him up. There were people rushing to the scene.  He’s not an easy horse to deal with when he’s all amped up like that.”

She didn’t know what had happened to him—could it be a broken leg? Please no.

After she was able to stop Dutch, the people who came to help put a cast on him and loaded him into the ambulance to bring him back to stabling.

A preliminary scan showed a rupture of the superficial digital flexor tendon. Following initial treatment, Dutch went back in the trailer and headed straight for the University of  Pennsylvania’s New Bolton Center, one of the country’s most highly regarded veterinary hospitals.

A later scan revealed, thankfully, that there was no involvement of the deep digital flexor tendon or suspensory ligament.

Arielle and her mother learned blunt force trauma is required in order for a tendon to rupture.

So how did it happen?

They speculated that when Dutch lost a shoe, possibly at the Foxcatcher Ditch hedge before the Roller Coaster, it might have flown off his right front hoof and hit his leg above his boot. Or he could have banged the leg on the back of a fence.

“It’s not anybody’s fault,” said Christina. “It’s just unlucky.”

The shock of the injury understandably shook Arielle.

“I was pretty much ready to quit riding–you know, I don’t have my friend,” she explained.

“I love the other horses, but this is the horse that made things happen for me. I wasn’t prepared at all to never do that (cross-country) with him again.”

But she does have other horses who need attention, and kept on going. Arielle rode two of them at the Waredaca, Md., Classic Three-Day Event and Horse Trials last month, finishing second and third in Open Preliminary on Littlebitadominic and Chumley. Now she hopes those horses can be promoted to Intermediate.

Meanwhile, Dutch’s most recent scan shows the tendon already is filling in a little bit. Christina noted the prognosis is “the nine-month standard tendon rehab.” However, the Arharonis reference the fact that Dutch bowed a tendon on his left front eight years ago when he had a different rider, and the vets didn’t have hope that he would be eventing again. He came back anyway.

At the moment, Dutch’s right leg is bandaged. He’s on hand-grazing and stall rest, with other horses in Arielle’s Branchburg, N.J., stable taking turns keeping him company in the next stall. Dutch amuses himself by tossing around his lead rope and trying to get his blanket, which is placed strategically out of his reach on the bar in front of his stall.

People have reached out with inquiries and supportive comments. Boeringer Ingelheim Animal Health sent along a case of Surpass, a non-steroidal anti-inflammatory drug that relieves pain and inflammation.

“It’s much appreciated,” said Christina.

Dutch will be going to the Aharonis’ farm in Ocala after Thanksgiving for more R&R in a friendly climate. The warm weather and limestone roads will help his healing process. After that, what he will do remains to be seen.

“He probably is not ready for retirement,” said Arielle.

“We have to hope for the best and give him something to do for the next three or four years until he starts to kind of age out.”

Possibilities include dressage, show jumping, low-level eventing or perhaps just being a mount for Christina, since she was the one who selected him all those years ago. One thing is for certain, though, said Arielle: “He’s staying with me for the rest of his life.”