Blogger Contest Final Round: Erin Critz

The final round Blogger Contest entries are in, and we’re offering you the opportunity to weigh in on each article before we declare a victor. We’ll post two of the entries today and the final two entries tomorrow, and a poll will go up on Thursday so you can vote for your favorite blogger.

Their Final Round Assignment: Much in the spirit of EN’s annual April Fool’s posts (see 2010201120122013), your final round assignment is to brainstorm an original idea for a fake news story and then write it up as a post for EN, complete with some sort of visual imagery you create (photo, video, diagram, drawing, etc.). We stress that access to expensive camera equipment is unnecessary; see Wylie’s FEI pictograms for proof that imagination, at least in the context of this assignment, will be your most invaluable asset. Words and visuals will be judged 50/50 on the same basis as previous entries (Interesting, Funny, Informative, Creative).

Here’s Erin Critz’s final installment (for Erin’s previous entries, see Round 1Round 2). Thanks for reading, Eventing Nation. Click here to read Rick Wallace’s previously posted final installment. Stay tuned for entries from Sally Spickard and Ella Rak. Please leave feedback in the comments section.

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Bio: Erin Critz is a former radio DJ, current IT professional and recovering Hunter/Jumper rider. Erin and her Morgan mare Akira Beijing compete in the Beginner Novice division on the West Coast. She aspires to tackle the N3D at Rebecca Farms in 2014 and finds writing 50 word bios challenging.

Entry:

Breaking News: USEA Announces Major Changes To Format

The Eventing community is buzzing today after the announcement of significant changes to Eventing in the United States. In an exclusive sit-down interview, Brian Sabo spoke about these changes and the future of our sport.

“We started collecting Event Evaluation forms a while ago. When we initially started the program we expected to get feedback about individual events – about footing, about course design. The plan was always to take that feedback to the individual events and to help them improve. We had secretly hoped we would get the occasional tidbit of scandalous gossip, like complaints about crabby office employees but what we found was much more compelling.

What we found in those Event Evaluation forms was a want to return to a more classic format. This wish to return to our roots came from riders of every level, nation wide. We thought long and hard about how to best honor our sport’s heritage and were thrilled by the opportunity to bring our sport more in line with the wishes of our membership. I am very pleased to announce that effective August 1st, 2013, the Dressage phase at all USEA Events will be replaced by a new phase called Cavalry Maneuvers. This exciting change not only pays homage to our sport’s cavalry roots, but also addresses one of the other significant issues in our sport today – every other Event Evaluation form was someone complaining about how boring Dressage is.”

When asked to detail what riders could expect and should prepare for in this new phase, Sabo indicated that the full set of Cavalry Maneuver Tests would be available on USEventing.com by July 4However, the story does not end there. EN has obtained what we believe to be a working draft of the Beginner Novice Cavalry Maneuvers Test.

click to view full size

UPDATE: Apparently digging in the trash is creepy and possibly illegal, even if it has journalistic purpose. When EN reporters returned to USEA Headquarters for further investigation, Sabo confronted our reporters. He promised not call the police as long as we promised to “never pull a stunt like this again” and to share this footage of riders from the Russian Eventing Federation. The Russian Eventing Federation is adopting the same changes and the video showcases some movements you can expect to see in the tests at Preliminary and compulsory movements for team competition.

 http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=knRpvurKuqU&NR

Go Team DF, Go Heritage, Go Eventing.

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