Blogger Sinead Halpin

About three months ago, I was walking down the grocery aisle with my über-healthy, vegetarian pentathlete boyfriend when he asked me, “If you knew that eating healthy and working out more would get you closer to an Olympic medal, would you start at least eating your greens?”

People keep asking me what I’m doing for Thanksgiving. I keep asking, “When is Thanksgiving?”

This time of the year is about taking some time out from the event season to be a “real person.” I’ll be honest, I’d rather listen to Foster The People’s new tune than the Mariah Carey Christmas music that every grocery store, Starbucks and gas station parking lot is belting out.

I went to a friend’s house the other night for dinner, and as I walked in, I realized by the way our host was decked out in team gear that we were actually there to watch a football game.

I’ve never quite understood how grown men and women get dressed up in team colors and get so involved to the point of literally a “game” ruining their day, week or even month. They have opinions on the players, the coach, they have notes on the venue and tabs on the weather, and they sometimes even know what’s been going on in the players’ personal lives.

I assume the position: fully dressed for cross-country, sitting on the tack trunk, striking my crop at the grass, adjusting my helmet, fidgeting with my watch and eventually settling into a deep stare at nothing in particular.

Sarah, my working student, asks if I’m all right. She’s not yet been to a competition with me where I’m heading out over an advanced track, and she’s confused by my lack of normal confidence and chatter.

I’ve timed it perfectly. I can get down to watch Michael Pollard’s dressage test in the riders’ tent at stabling and give myself exactly 25 minutes to get ready for my own dressage test. I already have my top hat and tails ready, and my breeches and shirt are in my bag, which is next to my spurs and boots.

I am literally congratulating myself on being so organized!

Well, we’ve been here a week, and I have to say it’s gone by so slowly and so quickly at the same time! Megan and I were driving home yesterday from Hartpury Horse Trials, and I turned down a horrible song on Radio 1 and asked, “Did we just do a three-star this weekend?” And she said, “Yup, actually this morning.” 

That’s one of the cool things about England—an hour down the road you can run a three-star with William Fox-Pitt, Andrew Nicholson, Bettina Hoy, Mark Todd, and a few Americans you know as well, and be home in time for an early dinner!

Tate and Megan have begun their adventure to the U.K., and I am sitting here (while I should be packing!) thinking that in exactly 30 days, whatever is going to happen in Europe will have happened. Time is a funny thing, in that I feel like it was just a few minutes ago when I was writing a blog about entering Rolex, and now here I am about to spend the next month in England preparing for the Land Rover Burghley CCI****.

When I got the call about going to the Olympic Test event I had mixed feelings. My first thought, on a selfish level, was excitement. I certainly was dying to see the venue. But my next thought was, “Is that the best use of USET dollars?” I know we need information about the venue as far as terrain and logistics, but isn’t this why we have our coaches, directors and managers go to the event? 

We had a very busy Father’s Day at S.H.E.!

We took four horses to compete at the Bucks County Horse Park Horse Trials (Pa.), and I’m really starting to enjoy competing quite a few in one day. If you have not such a great ride on one, you don’t have time to overanalyze—you just get thrown onto the next horse and kick on!