As you know I have traveled from home in Australia this week to Tallahassee Florida to help TD at Red Hills.
The XC courses look stunning, the weather is promising to be perfect, that is despite the heavy rain last night. But unfortunately, at this stage the Event is not the biggest show in town.
The biggest and most talked about show in town, is the race for the Chef/TA Job. Believe me, everyone is talking about it, we all want to know what the latest gossip is, who has said what and where this leaves the whole situation.
As a relative outsider, I have found the whole process quite amusing. This does not bode well for Team USA because at the very least this is a distraction that the team does not need at the moment.
Only last night the USEF issued a press release clarifying the key criteria that the selection committee utilized to whittle down the list, those criteria are as below, here is the press release.
- Accessibility, the riders expressed a keen desire to be able to jump in their truck, with a bunch of horses and drive to a farm run by the Head Coach. Surprisingly, not all of the applicants interviewed, expressed a desire to base themselves in the USA.
- The ability to jump in the saddle and feel what is going on. That meant someone with current riding skills, who spends a sizable amount of time in the saddle themselves.
- Good communicator and leader, they wanted someone who they could look up to for guidance, speaking clearly with a voice of experience.
The other key piece of information in the Press Release was that only two people would front up at the forum today, 1pm at Red Hills. If you are anywhere near Red Hills, I recommend you be here, it will be interesting. I think the Red Hills folks, should sell tickets and open a concession stand because I believe this is going to be one very interesting meeting.
Those two people are David and Leslie as selected by the Search Committee. That said, there may end up being more than one meeting. I saw Phillip last night and he will be at the meeting, although not up front. Will he hold his own meeting afterwards? Will any of the other candidates be there? Will any of the mystery four be there and show their hands, who knows?
What I do know is that almost everyone who is anywhere near the Red Hills venue will be at this meeting. Some are very vocal and will not hold back. There will be plenty of media there including John and Samantha from EN. I will be there too, as will all of the officials gathered here for Red Hills, we don’t want to miss the action.
I think there is a feeling that the Active Athletes will not accept a short list of two and will choose to interview more of the candidates, I am guessing Jimmy and Phillip/Bobby. I also have a feeling we will also hear from some of the mystery four, which will be interesting because to date their names have remained under wraps.
What I do know is all of this is great for Australian, British, New Zealand, Canadian and German Eventing. Why, because a distracted and unfocused Team USA is not likely to be in the medals.
I am waiting for the press release to follow in the near future saying that in the interests of providing stability and certainty to US Eventing, Captain Mark Phillips will stay on for another four years until Rio.
Oh and by the way in case you missed it, there is also and event on this weekend called Red Hills, that will be be great and will provide some exciting horse action, rather than coach action.
Yours in Eventing
ESJ
