The Slower Road

Neither we (the CAA) nor I will be at this year’s FEI World Pony Driving Championships, so I wanted to alert you to Shelley Temple’s blog. She’s a CAA member and is hoping to be named to the U.S. team, which will be competing for top pony-driving honors in Slovenia later this month. To that end, Shelley and her pony have spent part of the summer in Germany, training and competing.

And, Shelley, if you happen to read this: thank you for the photos from Mainz! I used to live there, and it was a treat to see the wonderful farmers’ market and cathedral square again.

And, finally, photos of the U.S. drivers on the marathon course (again, all photos courtesy of Marie de Ronde):

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First, Kathrin Dancer …

photo by Marie de Ronde

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photo by Marie de Ronde

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… then Misdee Miller …

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photo by Marie de Ronde

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photo by Marie de Ronde

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… and, finally, Joe Yoder …

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photo by Marie de Ronde

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photo by Marie de Ronde

A photo of each of the U.S. drivers in the dressage phase at the 2011 FEI World Pair Championship (all photos courtesy of Marie de Ronde):

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Joe Yoder (photo by Marie de Ronde)

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Misdee Wrigley Miller (photo by Marie de Ronde)

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Kathrin Dancer (photo by Marie de Ronde)

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… and Joe Yoder in the prize-giving ceremony for the dressage phase (he finished that phase in sixth place!):

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that's Joe on the far left; Germany's Carola Diener, in the blue hat and holding the dressage trophy, won the dressage phase and the individual gold medal in the overall championship (photo by Marie de Ronde)

A few photos of the U.S. team in the Opening Ceremony for the 2011 FEI World Pair Championship, courtesy of Marie de Ronde:

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Kathrin Dancer driving her pair (photo by Marie de Ronde)

Kathrin, with the U.S. team's chef d'equipe, Chester Weber (photo by Marie de Ronde)

Misdee Wrigley Miller and Joe Yoder (photo by Marie de Ronde)

guest post by Leslie Hernandez:

Sorry I couldn’t send anything yesterday, but the Internet wasn’t working.

Marathon day, as promised, was quite exciting! The obstacles were technical and tight. Each driver circled the same course five times, making the already mucky and deep course even more disgusting by the end of the day. Kathrin Dancer was the first American to go, and she was quick and nimble with her pair of chestnuts. Misdee Wrigley Miller was the next driver for the U.S.; she had a good round, with no errors of course. It poured down rain while she was driving, making visibility an issue. Joe Yoder was the last American of the day. He had some overzealous horses in the fifth obstacle, who jumped the creek. One landed with his leg over the pole, and down went the navigator. Somehow, they managed to fix it, while remaining hitched! Off he went again, but time was already a factor, not to mention the penalty points for a groom down.

There was a large crowd, which multiplied as the sun grew stronger.

The French were especially supportive, yelling “Allez!” to each of the eight French drivers. Their spirit was catching and soon we Americans were yelling at ALL the drivers. Jose got into the act, yelling in Spanish to the Argentinian driver, “Andale! Andale!” There were quite a few Dutch and British folk around, as well, cheering on their respective teams.

There were only two incidents that we saw during the day: a Polish driver completely demolished the white “B” in obstacle 6, a wooden fence post, and a Hungarian driver tried to take a flag pole with him around the same obstacle. Overall, though, the marathon was uneventful.

At the end of the day, places had been rearranged all over the leader-board, except for number one, Carola Diener, Christoph Sandmann’s groom, driving a pair from his team. The top ten were quite rearranged. It would be a very exciting cones competition on Sunday.

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When we arrived at the stadium on Sunday, the cones course looked like an ant colony, only the ants had on fancy hats and team jackets. Each competitor and team coach was quickly memorizing their path to greatness. We found seats early and camped out the rest of the day. Jose jumped up many times to watch the warm up and talk to friends.

The course was well laid out, with tight spots and a couple of long runs. Only a few drivers made the time, and only one driver really made it look easy: Vilmos Lazar of Hungary. He took us all to school, with a lesson on driving cones. One of his horses was a Lippizan, the other a Russain Trotter.

Joe Yoder and Kathrin Dancer fared well in cones. Misdee Miller got caught up in the moment and left out obstacle 15, getting eliminated in the process. Up until then, she had been smoking the difficult course. There were a couple of other mistakes during the day: drivers running over numbers out of order.

By the end of the day, the order was rearranged yet again, though German driver Carola stayed in first. For full results, visit the hoefnet website. It was a great experience, very different from American shows. I highly recommend going to a World Championship and visiting Conty, France!