The Slower Road

Another one of my favorite memories (well, series of memories) from last year’s World Equestrian Games?

Over the course of more than a year, our office location here at the Kentucky Horse Park (and knowing the designer and builders of the WEG driving course) afforded us the unique opportunity to watch the marathon course take shape. It literally grew before our eyes, and I feel very fortunate to have been able to share that progress here on the blog. If you missed it, you can click on the “WEG 2010” topic and scroll back through to the beginning.

Then, when the marathon course was finished and decorated came the chance to fly up above it all to photograph the finished marathon obstacles. What fun that was … even if it was rather windy up there!

And, on a similar note, what a treat it was to be able to be able to watch the Western vehicles moved into place at one of the marathon obstacles, and to see them all up close and to learn more about each one.

It was fun to be able to share these unique views here on the blog, and if you were following alond during WEG, I hope you enjoyed these peeks behind the scense as well.

One of my other favorite things about last year’s Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games?

The chance to see some of the horse world’s greatest superstars — both horses and people — in person. It’s one thing to hear the buzz surrounding the (formerly) Dutch superstar dressage horse Totilas, and to see photos and YouTube videos of him. But it’s quite another thing, I have to say, to be standing just a few feet from where he’s warming up for his dressage test. I didn’t get a chance to see his actual (gold-medal-winning) tests in person, but his warmup routine — heck, just the way he moves — is nothing short of breathtaking.

As an added bonus, I was able to see the equally magnificent Spanish dressage horse Fuego XII warming up for his test. I’m embarrassed to say that I didn’t know anything about this horse before the WEG but, my-oh-my, he’s a beauty.

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Fuego XII with Juan Manuel Munoz Diaz at the 2010 WEG …

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… in the warmup arena before one of their dressage tests

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he’s a gorgeous horse, no?

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On the night of the dressage Grand Prix Freestyle competition, the main stadium was packed. I wasn’t planning to stick around the Horse Park that night, as the competition was supposed to go till quite late. But I had received an offer to watch the event on a closed-circuit TV, and I figured that it would be silly to miss it.

Totilas was, indeed, magnificent … as we all knew he would be. And Fuego XII was awe-inspiring. I’ve never heard the audience at a dressage competition erupt into applause and cheers like they did after Fuego’s test. There was certainly no polite dressage/golf-clapping here that night.

After the final test, I walked through the deserted trade fair to catch the bus home … while the awards ceremony was taking place in the main stadium, under the lights, and to more loud cheers and applause. Even though I had watched the competition on a closed-circuit (not a “real”) TV, we were still a bit removed from the action, and it was easy to forget that what we watched was happening right then, just across the food court from where we sat. But the cheers from the stadium that night were another reminder that all those magnificent horses were right here.

One of my favorite things about the idea of a World Equestrian Games — often called the “Olympics for horses” — is the great mix of horse people. Unlike most “regular” horse shows and events, this isn’t just jumpers, or only dressage horses, or nothing but driving horses, etc.

One of my favorite things about this particular World Equestrian Games, and the fact that I was literally in the middle of it for the duration (and then some) was that I was able to see this wonderful mix — horses, sports, and people — firsthand.

There were jumpers cheering on reiners, drivers enjoying the eventing cross-country, competitors enjoying everything else going on at the venue, and on, and on, and on: two weeks of good-natured camaraderie that revolved around everyone’s mutual love of the horse, no matter what vocation any one person or horse had chosen.

Among all this horsey goodwill, one of my absolute favorite scenes took place late one evening during the first week of the Games.

Many of the Equine Village events aimed at children were stationed outside the CAA office, so we had a good view of children visiting with ponies, troops of spectators walking from the main stadium to the indoor arena for reining and vaulting competition, and the mechanical cutting horse, which invariably drew a large crowd of participants and spectators.

As I was getting ready to close the CAA shop around 7 o’clock one evening, most of the crowds had left our area, but the mechanical cutting horse was still in action. A couple of members of the U.S. reining team and their families were the mechanical horse’s last riders for the day, and they were having a blast. Apparently, the horse’s operator could adjust the difficulty level posed by the cutting horse and its calf (and I think he even controlled the horse’s movements), and most of the people we saw were riding at a basic level. But on this evening, the required skill level was ratcheted up several notches, and the reiners almost looked like they were riding a real cutting horse. I’m not sure a “real” cutting-horse rider would be laughing quite so much, though! It was a treat to see them and their families enjoying the evening and a bit of fun.

Today’s post is the first of six “WEG flashbacks,” in which I’ll share some of my favorite memories, images, and past blog posts from the WEG. These are in honor of the six-month anniversary of the 2010 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games, which concluded on October 10, 2010.

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In my opinion, the best aspect of an international sporting event, like the WEG, is the international “flavor” of the event.

People came from around Kentucky, from across the United States, and from all over the world, converging on Lexington and the Kentucky Horse Park for two weeks of top equestrian competition. I saw and met visitors from near and far on my daily bus rides between downtown and the Horse Park, in our CAA gift shop, and all over the WEG venue. Team members and fans decorated their bicycles, their golf carts, and themselves in their national colors and flags and urged their favorite riders and drivers on with cheers and chants and flag waving.

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people, bicycles ...

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... and golf carts were all decked out in national colors and flags

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fans getting themselves ready for show jumping at the 2010 WEG

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One of my other favorite “international” memories of the event was the lone media event I was able to attend. When we (media) checked in and received our media credentials, we also received a list of daily Alltech-sponsored events we were invited to attend. As lovely as they all sounded (trips, parties, events in the media “chill-zone,” a bourbon tasting, and more), there just wasn’t time to go to most of them. The one I managed to fit in was a special-event Chieftains concert. My husband was (sadly) out of town that night, but it was a treat — after a long day at work — to be able to watch a concert/party with Irish music, bluegrass music, Canadian fiddlers and step dancers, a Scottish singer, bagpipers, Irish dancers, opera singers, and an Alltech-sponsored children’s choir from Haiti.

I read later in our local newspaper that, while they were in town briefly for this special concert, the Chieftains enjoyed a visit and dinner with the Irish WEG team and the president of WEG sponsor Alltech, who is also Irish.

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Stay tuned for more WEG flashbacks, and please feel free to share your favorite WEG memories in the comments!