Heat and competition: how the FEI measures thermal stress.

This page describes how competition organisers and officials assess heat. It contains no cooling, care or treatment procedures. The FEI's own guidance states that a horse not coping with heat needs veterinary help. A person showing signs of heat illness needs medical care.

The FEI's hot-weather guidance

The FEI's guidance document "Preparation for and management of horses and athletes during equestrian events held in thermally challenging environments" was written by Dr David Marlin, Dr Martha Misheff and Dr Peter Whitehead and is dated March 2018. We read the copy hosted by British Equestrian. We did not find newer FEI heat guidance, so this is the most recent version in our research.

Where it came from

The document records that the heat at the 1992 Barcelona Olympics, especially in long-format eventing, led the FEI to launch an international scientific and veterinary welfare initiative in 1993, ahead of the Atlanta 1996 Games. More than 50 scientific papers were published between 1992 and 1996.

The WBGT index

The FEI adopted the Wet Bulb Globe Temperature (WBGT) index as its method for assessing thermal stress. WBGT combines air temperature, humidity, wind and solar radiation in one reading. The document calls it the only validated heat index for equestrian sport, developed for Atlanta 1996 and also used at Athens 2004 and Beijing 2008.

The eventing bands

The document reproduces the FEI Eventing Memorandum's recommendations for cross-country day, banded by WBGT reading:

A search summary of Equestrian Australia's 2018 hot weather policy says it treats a WBGT above 33 as high risk and potentially incompatible with safe competition; we did not read the policy, so that is unconfirmed.

What organisers are asked to plan for

For each discipline the guidance lists policy measures for organisers and officials, such as:

• scheduling to avoid the hottest part of the day;
• cooling facilities on site;
• contingency plans;
• closer veterinary monitoring;
• in eventing, driving and endurance, reducing the effort a course demands on the day according to the measured WBGT.

The document notes that riders and support staff also face a risk of heat illness, not only horses. It also notes that travel, dehydration and changes in diet can all raise the risk of colic in competition horses; colic is covered on the horse health page.

A championship stopped for heat: Tryon 2018

The endurance championship that opened the World Equestrian Games at Tryon, North Carolina, on 12 September 2018 was restarted after several riders were misdirected at the start. It was then shortened from 100 miles to 74 miles and from five loops to four, and finally cancelled before it finished. The Tryon Daily Bulletin (14 September 2018) reported that officials cited a potentially dangerous combination of heat, humidity and trail conditions after heavy afternoon rain. A WBGT reading of 31 was judged an unacceptable risk to horse welfare, with readings above 25 being watched closely. The FEI cited General Regulations Article 109.12 and its extreme-weather code, and asked its Equestrian Community Integrity Unit to investigate the misdirection.

The FEI said the decision was unanimous among the ground jury president, the technical delegate, the veterinary commission president and the organisers, and was taken for horse and athlete welfare. Search summaries report that some teams, including France and Spain, who were leading at the time, criticised the cancellation, and that France's technical director blamed organisational errors and a lack of FEI oversight; we could not read those reports, so the teams' side is unconfirmed.

Heat outside competition

World Horse Welfare states that horses regulate their body temperature well between about 5 and 25 degrees C, and that outside that range shelter or shade should be part of how they are kept. Questions about a particular horse in hot weather belong with its vet. For the endurance rules, which include veterinary inspections during the ride, see endurance.