Photo by Jenni Autry
The USEA has officially partnered with EquiRatings to implement the EquiRatings Quality Index (ERQI) at the national level in the U.S. The announcement comes after months of collaboration between the USEA and EquiRatings, which began following the USEA Annual Meeting and Convention in Fort Lauderdale last December.
The ERQI measures cross country risk by creating profiles for horses and tracking their individual performances. Based on collected data, the horse is assigned a numeric value between 0-1 for each level of competition that indicates the likelihood of that horse completing cross country without faults. The ERQI Rating can then be used by riders and federations to objectively evaluate the degree of risk.
“Within a few years, we expect the ERQI to be a globally recognized rating within our sport. This year we expect to process about 200,000 eventing results, creating about 30 million individual data points,” EquiRatings director Diarm Byrne said.
“The partnership with USEA is one we have been working towards for some time — the U.S. is the home of sports data and people here use and understand data in sport better than anywhere else in the world. I am delighted that at last U.S. equestrians will now have access to the same levels of data and data analysis that other mainstream U.S. sports have.”
EquiRatings and the FEI partnered in a four-year deal earlier this month to implement ERQI starting first at CCI4* level, with FEI Secretary General Sabrina Ibáñez calling ERQI “a powerful tool for understanding and predicting risk in eventing.”
“The USEA is committed to safety and this partnership with EquiRatings will allow for another piece of the safety puzzle to be put in place,” USEA Chief Executive Officer, Rob Burk, said.
“We are excited to be bringing this service to our members and think it will add valuable information for riders and horse owners in making responsible decisions related to their preparedness to compete. Thank you to Diarmuid, Sam Watson and the entire EquiRatings team for working to develop this relationship with the USEA.”
The USEA will release more details about the partnership over the coming weeks and months. The first steps involve EquiRatings developing individually tailored U.S. ERQIs based on the past performance of horses at national and international level. Beginning in late summer, ERQIs will be integrated with all USEA horse profiles on the USEA Online Services site.
EN has written extensively about ERQI and we recommend reading this piece to learn more.
[USEA to Partner with Equestrian Sports Data Company, EquiRatings]
