Ask AI Equestrian Edition: English Rider Roast

This time, we decided to see what AI would come up with if we asked it to roast English riders. Here’s what it came up with!

Last week we asked AI to roast Western riders. Well, we’re back at it, asking AI to create humorous equestrian related content we call all laugh at. This week, we’ve decided to ask AI to roast English riders.

*In case you didn’t know, roast means to “make fun of.”

Here’s what was AI generated…and it’s pretty funny!

All AI generated text replies are generated from ChatGPT.

Here’s the question we asked AI, “Write a passage roasting English horseback riders.”

And…here’s what it came up with:

Photo by Mindy Demshar-Maxey

“The (Slightly Snobby) Saga of English Riders”

Ah, English riders — the refined, disciplined, and ever-so-slightly insufferable equestrians of the horse world. The ones who think they’re the elite, scoffing at anything with a saddle horn while sipping their overpriced iced lattes. They’ll tell you that their discipline is “more technical” and “more elegant” than Western riding, conveniently forgetting that half of them can’t mount without a step stool and their horses require more maintenance than a European sports car.

Let’s start with the wardrobe. English riders love to act like they’re practical, but then they insist on wearing skin-tight breeches that show everything, tall leather boots that require at least one assistant and a can of boot polish to put on, and a show coat designed for 18th-century aristocracy. And let’s not forget the helmet — because safety is paramount, but vanity is more important, and you can bet that helmet cost at least $500 because it has rose gold accents.

Then there’s the saddle, or as Western riders like to call it, “the leather pancake.” English riders will swear that their saddles provide a closer feel and better balance—until they accidentally shift their weight wrong and go flying over their horse’s shoulder like a failed circus act. And let’s not forget the stirrup leathers, which are basically designed to pinch your skin like a medieval torture device.

And the horses? Oh, English riders are connoisseurs of bloodlines. They won’t just tell you they own a Thoroughbred or a Warmblood. No, no. They’ll tell you their horse is by “Sir Reginald von Majestic” out of “Lady Belladonna de Prestige III.” And if it’s an off-track Thoroughbred? They’ll never stop reminding you that it was a racehorse, even though it retired after one slow sprint and now spends its days spooking at flower pots.

Speaking of spooking — English horses are Olympic-level experts in dramatic overreactions. A shadow? Terrifying. A leaf blowing in the wind? Absolutely life-threatening. A jump they’ve successfully cleared a hundred times before? Suspicious at best. But don’t you dare blame the horse, because an English rider will insist it’s just “expressing itself” or “feeling fresh.”

At a show, English riders turn into full-blown perfectionists. They’ll spend hours bathing, braiding, and polishing their horse until it’s shinier than their own car. They’ll make sure every hair is perfectly in place, only for their horse to roll in the dirt the second they turn their back. And their tack? Cleanliness is everything. If there’s so much as a speck of dust on that bridle, it’s a national crisis.

Then there’s the jumping crowd — the ones who casually say, “Oh, it’s just a little 3’6” course,” as if that isn’t the height of an actual refrigerator. They’ll tell you that falling off is just part of the sport, but you know they’re secretly praying no one caught it on video. And don’t even get them started on distances. They’ll spend hours analyzing striding like NASA engineers, only for their horse to launch itself over a jump from three feet away like a deer on roller skates.

And then there are the dressage riders — the ones who insist that their sport is the “ballet of horseback riding.” They’ll spend thousands of dollars perfecting a 20-meter circle and act like they’re training for the Olympics, even though their horse still occasionally tries to exit the arena at C. They’ll use words like “impulsion” and “engagement” while riding a horse that’s clearly just trying to survive another lesson without having a meltdown over the judge’s booth.

But for all their quirks, English riders are just as horse-obsessed as the rest of us. Sure, they may be a little dramatic about their sport, and yes, they may spend more on their riding wardrobe than on their actual human wardrobe, but at the end of the day, they’re just doing what they love — one overanalyzed dressage test, over-ambitious jump course, and overpriced saddle pad at a time. And really, what’s funnier than that?

Photo by Mindy Demshar-Maxey

We feel like AI went pretty hard on the English riders compared to the western riders. However, we still got a good chuckle. We hope you laughed as much as we did.