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!
The Slower Road 