My pick for best dressed lady: Becky Holder. Girl looks good!
Good morning Eventing Nation!
I know it’s technically not THE GAMES, but I’m so excited! And, I know I cannot get this post to you fast enough. But, I dare say, all you die-hards out there have probably already found all the news. Even though there’s not much going on to speak of…HA! As the only member of the EN team NOT at Rolex, I’m living vicariously through the coverage EN is providing us. A big thanks to Samantha, Visionaire, Abby, Wylie, John and the rest of the crew for thoroughly documenting Role and taking the time to create such great posts.
We already have big winners!!!! Karen O’Connor and Doug Payne won the “best dressed” award from Dubarry. Word on the street is that Karen needs to take “running-in-high-heels” lessons from Lainey Ashker. Eventers, we’re multi-talented.
And Peter Barry won the Rolex raffle. Lucky duck!
Rolex First Horse Inspection Photo Galleries: [USEA] [Sidelines]
Dubarry contest (Update): Today is the first day for the Dubarry contest, which will end in someone winning a trip for two to Ireland! Click here for details. Today’s photo prompt is to “Dubarry Team Pose” – Find the Dubarry team at the Dubarry booth or find your own location and create the ultimate Dubarry team pose. Enter your photo on the Dubarry Facebook page starting at 9am.
The Courier Journal tried to recap exactly what Rolex is for the non-eventer. They did have some good quotes on the course design: “The cross-country course is going to be tight because of space constrictions in (Olympic venue) Greenwich Park,” he said. “Our course designer, Derek di Grazia, tried to replicate what they will face there. It’s much tighter than in the past and is going to call for a more technical ride, rather than a full-out gallop around the course.” But, finishing the cross country course as quickly as possible isn’t exactly what the goal is… [finish at/under optimum time]
A terrific first day Rolex recap video from the USEA. Lots of great interviews: Buck talks about his socks, WFP talks about how awesome he is, Doug Payne and Will Coleman talk about their designers. Quite fun. [click here]
COTH has a quick recap of today’s jog events. Mighty Nice slipped on a banana peel, Becky looked awesome in scarlet, and unfortunately, one horse was spun. [COTH]
Where would eventing be without our OTTBs? There are lots entered at Rolex this year. There’s a gala being hosted by several big time organizations including USEF, AAEP, and the Jockey Club among others to give retired TBs a life after the track. They have started TIP, the TB Incentive Fund. There are 19 OTTBs eligible at Rolex to win, and the highest placed will take home $1000 and a cooler. [Go OTTBs]
The Lexington Herald-Leader also has a quick recap of the days events. They’ve got some fun pictures as well as mentioning WFP and the Grand Slam. No pressure there. [LHL]
Even Boyd gets nervous for jogs! He recaps today’s events for his horses and his students. All accepted! He also mentions that he’d take every horse there back home. [He’ll need a bigger trailer]
Brian Murphy, Sara Kozumplik’s boyfriend and show jumper is blogging about his first 4* event. He thought the jog looked like a fashion show, (horse girls like to shower too!), and that just walking xc required a fitness program. He also thought the William from across the pond and the William from VA looked like Justin Bieber and Justin Timberlake, but you figure out which is which. He even says how nice Sara looked, and she looked like a movie star! He’ll be blogging all weekend. [COTH]
Phillip Dutton has some nice words to say about Boyd and Neville as well as Hiroshi Hoketsu, the 70 year old Japanese eventer headed to London, on the USA Today Sports Olympic series. He also mentions that his fitness goals are not to bulk up, but to work for “long stretchy, elastic kind of muscles.” He also notes that riding 10-12 horses a day keeps him in pretty good shape. [USAToday]
Shane Rose is aiming to win the Sydney CCI3* this weekend. He bought his current mount, Taurus, before Beijing in hopes to compete at London with him. They’re 3 for 3 winning the last events entered. ESJ is there bringing us all the coverage. [Herald Sun] [WWOS]
Lots of love for those OTTBs! I know I love em! The NY Racing Association and NY TB Horseman’s Association have pledged prize money to all of NY’s 10 events held this year. There’s over $30,000 of prize money up for grabs for the top scoring (and reserve) OTTBs. The program is called Career2 and modeled after Take2 which is the same program for the H/J world. Teas is also starting their own Take2 program. [Support OTTBs]
Just as an aside, I wanted to mention to you that there are other CCI4*s in the world in case you were so enamored with all the Rolex chatter. Badminton is next week. No rest for the wicked! Horse and Hound has kindly put together coverage, and we thank you for sharing this with us:
Horse & Hound will be running our popular H&H Live service — interactive written commentary delivered in association with Baileys
Horse Feeds — across all four days of the Mitsubishi Motors Badminton Horse Trials 2012.
On dressage days (4 and 5 May), former British dressage team member Anna Ross Davies will give her expert — and entertaining — opinion on every horse through the ring, while on cross-country (6 May) and showjumping (7 May) days, H&H staff will provide up-to-the-minute
written updates.
Wherever you are in the world, this is a great way to keep up with all the action from Badminton as it happens on your computer or your smart phone and you can also get involved by taking part in polls and posting comments. Find our live coverage at
www.horseandhound.co.uk/badminton2012live.
You can read the “behind the scenes preparations” that Carol Phillips is putting together for the Badminton coverage for H&H. Sounds like a great time with a “eventing geek off” and a team quiz! [H&H]
And, as if there wasn’t enough going on this weekend, Turkmenistan is celebrating National Horse day on Sunday. [Horsetalk]
And, because this is just so epic: this is what determination looks like.
Update: Wednesday at Rolex Kentucky from Josh Walker, Frankie Thieriot, and the USEA
Go eventing!
