Giffords cushion ride and cushion bed - any experiance?

[kombikids]

has anyone used the above for the surface of their school- cushion ride - or know what their bedding - cushion bed is like?

http://www.giffords.biz/ride/ride1.htm

THANKS

[zoeshiloh]

Our arena is cushionride - all I will say is do not touch with a bargepole if you can afford better!!

It is like riding on an icerink in the wet (and remember we are in England!) horses seem to slip all over the place, and jumping in the wet is almost impossible! You take your horses life in your hands when you lunge on it too.

Our arena is 30 x 65 and was professionally installed, the YO chose cushionride, and the company came and spread it etc, so no corners cut. It still rides very badly. The YO has been told that it can take up to 3 years to bed in properly and become a good surface to ride on. It also has to be regularly topped up as it rots down over the years.

Also the woodchips often get lodged under bandages/boots and even under shoes (the horses). Two horses have fallen over in the arena going around corners - one being ridden and the other being lunged.

I don't know anything about the bedding, so cannot help you there I'm afraid.

[LCobby]

Our yard has had one for three years now
We have had no problems at all and our heavy cobs move well on it. It was well rolled, and installed on good drainage.
Not had one day when its been unridable

[Penniless]

We have it on the floor of our horsewalker, which sits on top of the concrete and it's never moved. In fact, even when it's pouring down with rain, it still enables us to safely use the walker with five horses on at the same time, with none of them slipping at all. We've had it for nearly a year now and it hasn't been topped up once. We've also got it on our all-weather exercise track and rides fantastically. Admittedly, it does get heavy - especially lately with the amount of rain we've had, but that's because we are unable to get on the fields at the moment to harrow it. We've also got it in the lunging pit and we do have a problem here though, because we put it down on top of mud, and over the years it's merged in with the mud. We are planning though, (if we ever get a dry spell) to dig the mud out to a base and then put the cushionride on top again.

As for bedding, been using that for a number of years now and it's been fantastic. This year was the first year we've even foaled down on it and no problems. Thankfully our mares don't sweat up so nothing stuck to them anyway, but it was firm but very comfortable for the foals.

The look of it puts a lot of people off, but we know quite a large number of people who use it (including many top Newmarket racing yards) and judging by the amounts they order regularly, they aren't having a problem with it either.