Beautiful evening ride along the Zuid Willemsvaart in Belgium. Photo by Irma Vijn.
I forget how much base level fitness my horses have because of where they live. My turnout fields are large and mostly on the side of the hill, and my neighbor is an avid fox-hunter with a little over 2,000 acres of open space easement land filled with trails and coops and gates. That means that on “off” days, we regularly go exploring for miles over some pretty intense terrain, and they’re all pretty cool with it. However, my friend brought her normal horse over for a little hack this week, and three days later I think he still deeply regrets the power-walk that he started out with. Fun fact about extreme trail riding with Kate, you can’t just get tired and quit, you have to turn around and still get home!
U.S. Weekend Preview
Course Brook Farm Fall H.T. (Sherborn, MA) [Website] [Entries] [Ride Times] [Volunteer][Scoring]
ESDCTA New Jersey H.T. (Allentown, NJ) [Website] [Volunteer]
Fleur de Leap H.T. (Folsom, LA) [Website] [Volunteer] [Scoring]
Jump Start H.T. (Lexington, KY) [Website] [Entries] [Ride Times] [Volunteer] [Scoring]
Ocala Fall Horse Trials (Ocala, FL) [Website] [Volunteer]
Old Tavern Horse Trials (The Plains, VA) [Website] [Entries] [Volunteer] [Scoring]
Spokane Sport Horse 9th Annual Fall H.T. (Spokane, WA) [Website] [Entries] [Ride Times][Volunteer] [Scoring]
Stable View Oktoberfest 2/3/4* and H.T. (Aiken, SC) [Website] [Entries] [Volunteer]
Sundance Farm H.T. (Plymouth, WI) [Website] [Entries] [Ride Times] [Scoring]
Tomora Horse Trials (Greeley, CO) [Website] [Volunteer] [Scoring]
Major International Events
2023 Asian Games (Hangzhou, China) [Equestrian Schedule and Info]
News From Around the Globe:
Registration for the 2023 USEA Annual Meeting & Convention opens on Oct. 1, and USEA Members won’t want to miss this jam-packed week of social gatherings and educational activities. This year’s convention will be held on Dec. 7-10, 2023 in St. Louis, Missouri. On October 1, the registration portal will be available through the Convention webpage on the US Eventing website. The most cost-effective registration type is a full week pass which gives members access to all open meetings on Thursday through Saturday and includes one ticket to the USEA Annual Meeting of Members Luncheon. [Registration for USEA Annual Meeting Open Sunday]
The USEF has made five rule changes which will go into effect October 1, 2023. Make sure you familiarize yourself with these rule changes below to make sure you are in compliance before heading out for your next event! [New Rule Changes for 2023]
If you’ve ever dreamed of being the ultimate Eventing tourist, you have to know more about Eventing Breaks. Eventing Breaks aims to offer a hassle-free travel experience to eventing enthusiasts but with some unique add ons. Yes, they’ll organize all the basics like flights, airport transport, where to stay, or how to get tickets to a major event like Badminton, Burghley, or even the Olympics but they also provide some pretty cool add-ons. Like drinks with William Fox-Pitt at Badminton in his lakeside pavilion before a course-walk. At Burghley, the group enjoyed a post-xc drinks party at The English Pink Rose Co. Eventing Breaks wants to make the sport of eventing easier than ever to experience. [Eventing Breaks is Making Dreams Come True]
From the haunted steed of the Headless Horseman to the ghost riders in the sky, horses have always figured prominently in our favorite hair-raising tales we love to tell this time of year. Horses have the power to invoke our deepest emotions, and when you take a horse with mane and tail a-blowing in a chill October breeze as the sun dips down beneath the horizon and the air grows suddenly cool, the shadows playing tricks on your eyes, you have the perfect recipe for a ghost story for the ages. And we want to hear yours! Send in your best horsey Halloween stories to Horse Nation. [Second Annual Spooky Short Story Contest]
Feel-good story of the week goes to this tale of humanity at the highest level of sport. When 14-year-old Mathilde Candele was competing on her heart-horse, Disco, last year at the NAYC, she won her first class, but in the warmup for the second, Disco started feeling off. Her parents rushed him to the hospital, thinking it was colic, but in fact he had ruptured a major artery. Within a few hours, McLain Ward called the family and offered to give them a horse out of his barn to replace Disco for Mathilde. [Losing One Unicorn, Gaining Another]
