After a season of thrill-a-minute event live streams, following the FEI General Assembly in real time might seem like a drag. But you just never know what sort of madness the FEI thinktank will cook up when you gather them up from all round the world and stuff them into a room together (who can forget their proposed rebranding of eventing to “equestrian triathlon,” “equestrathon” or “tri-equathlon” in 2015) …
… so it’s best to keep a close eye on their proceedings. We appreciate that they make that easy via transparent coverage, including a live stream of the sessions and rolling online updates.
This 2018 General Assembly takes place on Tuesday, Nov. 20 at the Gulf Hotel in Manama, the capital of Bahrain often mistaken for this Muppets song. You can watch it live from 9 a.m. local time, which shakes out to 1 a.m. EST, right here or via the FEI website … or not and just catch up via the live blog or sit tight for EN’s breakdown later in the day.
This go-round the FEI Bureau is on fire already, on Saturday acknowledging that the seven-discipline World Equestrian Games format might need to get scrapped since literally nobody wants to host the next one in 2022, and agreeing to open a bidding process for individual world championships in all divisions. See EN’s report on that here.
An outline of this year’s agenda can be viewed here. FEI officials have actually already been at it for three days with regional group meetings, bureau meetings, dressage judging and rules sessions, and a number of lunch buffets and poolside dinners. The 2018 Awards Gala, presented by Longines, takes place at on Tuesday evening.
A synopsis of main decisions thus far can be viewed here. Those which pertain to eventing:
- The Olympic Eventing test event (CCI3*-S) will be held at the Tokyo 2020 venues Aug. 10-12, 2019.
- The Chair of the Eventing Committee provided an update to the Bureau on the latest developments and ongoing progress of the FEI Eventing Risk management program, including the development of predictive analysis tools for risk management. The improved quality of the information being analyzed will be further enhanced when the online reporting is introduced for officials at FEI Events.
- The Bureau approved the rules for the Event Rider Masters (ERM) 2019 series and the 2019 TriStar Eventing Grand Slam. The approval of the 2019 Eventing Nations Cup calendar was postponed to the second Bureau meeting after the General Assembly. The Bureau agreed to a gradual implementation of the Eventing Committees’ rule proposal of increasing the prize money for the Eventing Nations Cup for 2020.
- Geoff Sinclair (AUS) was appointed as a member of the FEI Eventing Committee for the four-year term 2018-2022 replacing the outgoing member Patricia Clifton (GBR).
FEI Ordinary General Assembly 2018 – Morning Session
FEI Ordinary General Assembly 2018 – Afternoon Session
Go Eventing.
