Perfect Patty goes from Five-Star to Foxhunting! Photo by Susan Clarke.
I’ve been thinking a lot lately about my relationships of trust between my horses, and how my view on consciously cultivating this has changed over the years. Even as a teenager, I always loved working with the horses that didn’t really trust other people, but looking back now, I made soooo many mistakes out of ignorance and/or emotional dis-regulation. Mistakes are part of the learning curve, but I look at the horses I have now and wish I could have done better. That’s what our horse journey is all about right? Improving all the time and chasing that high of the “aha” moment!
U.S. Weekend Preview
FEH & YEH Last Chance Qualifier & West Coast Championships (Paso Robles, CA): [Website] [Entries/Times/Scoring] [Volunteer]
Chattahoochee Hills H.T. (Fairburn, GA): [Website] [Entries] [Ride Times] [Scoring]
Full Moon Farms H.T. (Finksburg, MD): [Website] [Entries] [Volunteer]
Major International Events
Les 5 Étoiles de Pau:[Website] [Entries] [Schedule] [Save 15% on H&C+ Annual] [H&C+ Live Stream] [EN’s Coverage] [EN’s Ultimate Guide to Pau] [EN’s Instagram] [Visit Kentucky Performance Products]
News From Around the Globe:
If you read nothing else this week, make this your one article. There have been serious discussions about the safety of Eventing for decades now, and we’ve made great leaps with rules, regulations, course design, and jump building, but the final key is rider responsibility. The question is, how can you possibly regulate that? At the end of the day, it comes down to personal responsibility to know that just because your horse is qualified to move up, it’s not ready. Just because your horse didn’t have five rails, maybe it’s still struggling with the height. [Five Questions Between Safe and Sorry]
When a former five-star horse and a life-long septuagenarian combine forces, great things can be accomplished. Roisin O’Rahilly has ridden her whole life, but her most recent accomplishment is being named the third-ever USEA Century Ride Award recipient. This award celebrates horse and rider pairs who complete an event with a combined age of 100 or more. After placing first in their Beginner Novice division aboard, Rachel Jurgen’s, 26-year-old former five-star Thoroughbred, Ziggy, at the Five Points Horse Trials in September, O’Rahilly, age 79, checked another goal in the saddle off of her list – and she doesn’t aim to slow down any time soon. [Five Star to Century Ride]
We’ve seen the East Coast YEH championships, but now we have the West Coast finale! With stacked fields in the five-year-old, four-year-old, and FEH classes, it’s going to be an exciting weekend to catch some future stars. [Fast Facts: YEH West Coast]
It is finally “Spooky Season” and Halloween is right around the corner! Costumes for horses and their humans can be fun, cute, or clever. The creativity, enthusiasm, and sometimes downright brilliant horsemanship that equestrians put into creating their costumes is a joy to see every year. However, costumes can sometimes make people feel uncomfortable, unsafe, and unwelcome. Costume decisions can be harmful or offensive to others if they appropriate or mock a culture or faith, promote a stereotype, or are racist. With the help of The Inclusion Playbook, the USEF put together a brief guide of common costume pitfalls to avoid when dressing up. [Costume or Cultural Appropriation]
