The Candian vet inspections were held Sunday afternoon at Chattahoochee Hills, presided over by the great Dr. Ober, and the US inspections are being held as I type this. Basically, the vets jog and flex each horse, and then do whatever imaging or further analysis is necessary to give them a full understanding of the horse. Of course, the farriers are also very involved in the process. It’s a terribly nervous time for the riders because years and years of hard work culminates with a soundness evaluation, something that is at this point completely out of their control.
For me, the biggest challenge in predicting the team selections is trying to figure out the selectors’ strategy with the two individual picks. Remember that the US and Canada both have 6 WEG spots–4 team and 2 individual. The priority in picking the team spots is to select the four pairs with the best expected score and a high degree of certainty that at least 3 of them will complete without a stop on XC. However, the individual selections are a little different because the difference between getting 3rd versus 4th at the WEGs is a lot bigger than the difference between getting 4th and 10th–it’s all about getting a medal. Therefore, it might make sense to take a horse who probably won’t be in the top-15 but has a chance to put together the perfect weekend and get 3rd over the horse who is likely to finish in the top-15 but doesn’t have as much upside for that ‘perfect weekend.’ Again, I am only talking about the individual selections–for the team spots you undoubtedly take the sure top-15 horse. With that little selection paradox in mind, make your WEG picks below:
Pick the 6 pairs that you think should make the US team. Of course, this might be very different from who you think will make the WEG team, but let’s stay optimistic. Remember that Phillip, Buck, and Boyd can only ride one horse each.
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**Update: We closed this poll Monday afternoon because Canada announced their team!
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Much more later today. Go eventing.
