PrintOur columnist sees too many eventers honing their focus on dressage and show jumping and allowing their cross-country skills to suffer.
As I sit here at my computer, reflecting after The Fork CIC*** (N.C.), it’s hard to keep from wondering, “Are my horses as ready as they can be for their fast-approaching three-days? Is the dressage where it needs to be, or can I eke out a few more points? Can I leave the colored poles up on Sunday?”
When you’re a professional event rider, these pesky little questions never really go away. There’s always a next dressage test to focus on, and there’s always another show jump in your path. But, honestly, what I’m most concerned about is what will happen on Saturdays.
“Is ‘Ty’ [Titanium] fit enough for his first CCI**** at Rolex Kentucky? Is ‘Libby’ [Absolute Liberty] comfortable with all of the questions that will be asked in Ocala, Fla., over the weekend at her first two-star?”
Cross-country is the bread and butter of our sport, so I keep wondering why, these days, it seems like it’s an afterthought.
As one of the perks of being on the U.S. Equestrian Federation’s High Performance Training Lists, many of us riders went to Wellington, Fla., to practice dressage and show jumping over the winter with experts in those respective disciplines, and many of us made major gains with our horses. Those, we hope, will be evident in the first and third phases of our upcoming CCIs.
But what have we been doing to improve our cross-country performances? Did anyone go to Ireland to foxhunt or gallop race horses over the winter? I, for one, did not.
I used to ride in steeplechases, I worked in Ireland, and I hunted three days a week. Having grown up hunting across the open land in Chester County, Pa., the cross-country phase is more natural for me than the two other phases. That’s why, up until now, I’ve generally worked harder on dressage and show jumping than I did on the middle phase.
But today the cross-country courses are so different from what they used to be that I think it’s time we put more stress on the importance of practicing more than just lead changes in the dressage arena and gymnastics in the jumping. The level of cross-country riding in our country has declined in the past 10 years. Many of our horses just aren’t ready for the levels in which they’re competing, nor are our riders.
Back To School
This morning I was cross-country schooling a few of the horses I’m scheduled to ride in the Florida CCI** this coming weekend. As I was doing my final touch-ups at beautiful Longwood Farm in Ocala, I ran into Leslie Law and Karen O’Connor. Meanwhile, Betsy Watkins, the owner of Longwood, was out on her tractor moving jumps around for the three of us so we’ll be ready for Ocala and Kentucky.
Eventually, we all started talking about how people don’t take the time to practice cross-country anymore. To me, the cross-country seems to be getting so hard and technical that horses need to practice it more than ever before, and they need to be ready to expect the unexpected. This only comes from repetition and practice.
