22 Days Until The First Horse Inspection: Early Entry Notes

IMHO, It would be really cool if you guys could give us some more info on more of the first time 4* riders . It does seem like there are a lot of veteran riders this year (which is great!) but I would love to hear about the ones who are at the cusp of achieving one of the greatest feats in our sports: competing in a 4*.

Hey Anonymous, that's a great suggestion, and I totally agree. Obviously, we are strongly featuring a first time 4* entrant in Lauren Kieffer, who is one of our guest bloggers. Also, we are planning several posts about lesser know foreign and domestic riders. Thanks for the great suggestion because it helps to affirm our work in that direction.

Leslie Law has never won a 4*?
He won the Olympics but that is only 3*.

hey Lec, fair enough, I wasn't sure if the Olympics has a specific star rating, but I just added the phrase "or individual Olympic" Personally, I think that winning the Olympics is the ultimate achievement in eventing because it transcends the size of our sport. In other words, 99.99% of the World's population has never heard of Badminton, but you can walk into any bar in the World as an Olympic champion and be recognized as a top athlete, whatever your sport might be. That said, I understand the XC isn't as tough as the top 4*'s.

The Olympics was downgraded after Sydney to 3* to allow more aspiring nations to compete. WEG is 4* though and in fact a WEG champion/Olympic Champion is greater than a 4* winner as more people target these championships so make the effort to go there.

I counted 72.. there are still 20 horses between all the riders with multiple mounts but Boyd now has 3, and Jose Ortelli is now only on 1. Curious if someone will be taking the ride on Bruce's horses...

>>Anonymous: The lists seems to be changing on a daily basis, but thanks for the heads up. Interesting question about Bruce's horses.

>>lec: I have heard the same thing about the Olympics being a 3*, but it's interesting that the USEA results still call it a 4* so it's hard to tell. For example, Connaught's results: http://useventing.com/competitions.php?id=831&horse_id=10910

Anyone know anything about the Australian entry, Peter Atkins? I think one of his horses (Figjam - not entered for Rolex) might have come from over here. But I can find nothing about him anywhere. Intriguing!

Re: Peter Atkins (AUS) Peter's been in the US at least 10 years, and I believe a few longer than that. He's from Tasmania and from a horsey family. He rode through the *** level as a YR (I believe, this is reaching back in my memory) and this is the first time the stars have aligned to get to the **** level. He's a tactful rider that can sit on anything and improve it. He has a young son with wife Amy. He can open a beer bottle with anything, including a rubber dog bone.

I've known Peter from Clinics he's done around the southeast. He's from Tasmania; his family has a small horse farm there and raise young TBs for the track. Peter takes after his parents; he's a great natural rider and very good with young horses. As a younger guy he evented competetively while in the Aussie air force, but they didn't allow him enough time off to compete seriously at the upper levels. So I'm glad to see him entered at Rolex at this stage of his career. He's converted his truck to run on biodiesel, actually waste cooking oil that he gets from Chinese restaurants, which is pretty cool.

Peter's horse Figjam did indeed come from Australia. He has a younger mount-- Henry. He's a beauty with lots of talent-- still a little young.He competed a horse for me in "03-- wonderful guy and fabulous w/ the horses. I'm psyched for him-- it's about time!

Peter was the helmet cam ride from Red Hills, right? He put in a fantastic xc ride... very cool that he'll be at Rolex and I look forward to seeing more of him.

Yep, agree with all of those comments. Peter is not only a natural talent, he is a fantastic trainer (and hilarious, to boot). I have had him work with young horses and problem horses as well as those for which I needed a ride in years past. My niece took catch lessons from him at Millbrook last year and was raving! He's based in Vermont in the summers and Ocala in the winters.