I’m sure I’ll anger a lot of people by starting this year-end column with the observation that 2005 will not be a year we’ll all hold in our minds as a watershed year for the sport of eventing.

There were no fantastic achievements, no new ideas or celebratory events held around the world. Yes, there were some great perfor-mances–Kim Severson and her partnership with Winsome Andante in winning the Rolex Kentucky CCI**** for the third time, and Phillip Dutton’s continued steady search for the big wins in competitions around the world (second, fourth and fifth at Kentucky and second at the Burghley CCI**** [England] last year).

The announcement in December that the Kentucky Horse Park will host the 2010 World Equestrian Games comes close to being a watershed moment, although I know that the actual World Equestrian Games will overshadow the announcement. Really, there wasn’t one thing, one moment, in eventing that we will remember for years.

It seems like the sport as a whole finally got to take a big breath and coast for a while after the turmoil of the last few years, turmoil that’s changed our sport forever. (I’m talking mostly about the debate over the long format and the short format, in case you hadn’t guessed).

I’m certainly not a person who looks back. These changes will continue to take eventing into the future with more tools to try and deal with the ever-increasing costs of competing and of producing competitions and horses to ride in them. I’m worried that there are still riders out there who will try and hold onto something that’s already changed. I hope that we all can work toward this goal of making these new competitions as good as the old ones were.

Everyone thinks they had it harder when they were involved in any activity, back in “the old days.” How many times have we all heard, “Well, back in my day we walked all the way to school?” (Probably carrying their younger sibling on their back, both ways, up hill!) But, realistically speaking, you cannot stop evolution. So let’s keep going in the new direction.

Treasured
We lost many of our friends in 2005. Beale Morris, who died suddenly in March, will be missed forever as a shining star who showed how the sport can be played with grace and humor. Liz Cochrane, who died in December, was an international groom for her whole short life, and she was certainly one of the best. There were others too numerous to mention and probably too personal to share, and they all should make us realize how lucky we are to have a way of life that allows us to play with horses, in so many varied ways.

Since I’m beginning my third year as president of the U.S. Equestrian Federation, I go around to a lot of horse activities and meetings outside of eventing. And I’m always impressed by the professionalism and, especially, the passion that people have for their horses and their horse sports. Losing friends like Beale and Liz makes us remember that we’re not here for long and that every day with our horses, and the people around them, is a day to treasure.

We get caught up in the moment of competition–whether we’re competitors or organizers–and sometimes we lose our perspective. There is a way to win and a way to be competitive and to be graceful to others. They’re not mutually exclusive concepts. It’s good for all of us to keep that in front of us as we make our way through this life.

New Energy
As 2006 gets underway, I can see some new energy to some ideas that have just started. The USEA Young Horse Championships is a growing part of this sport, and I look forward to this being a bigger part of the eventing calendar as the interest from the breeders and competitors increases. Any great idea has a rippling effect on the sport, and I believe this competition has the possibility to make our sport even more valuable to professionals and amateurs alike.

The World Equestrian Games will be in Aachen, Germany, this August, and I’m looking forward to it since it looks as if it will be the biggest WEG yet. The Germans will run a fantastic championships, and it could even be the first really financially successful WEG, even though there have been four of them since the first one in 1990.

On the home front, the squad that we’ll be sending will have a big hill to climb. The U.S. team is going through a transition phase right now, and it’s not
clear who will be the next stars in the sport. Obviously Kim Severson is a real star since she’s won the Rolex Kentucky CCI so many times, along with an Olympic individual silver medal and a World Championship team gold medal. But who will join her?

The door is wide open, and there are a lot of riders truly trying to get through it. But I don’t know which ones will make it. We have a tremendous number of talented riders here in the United States, but we don’t have enough really good horses for them. And we don’t have enough riders who are putting together a team of horses. The USEF Eventing High Performance Committee has put together a new coaching structure that I hope will help and bring these riders to the next level of championship competition. Under this program, Robert Dover is coaching event riders in dressage and Laura Kraut is coaching them in show jumping.

In A Heartbeat
The announcement in December that the 2010 World Equestrian Games will be at the Kentucky Horse Park was a huge deal for the USA. These four years will go by in a heartbeat.

And we better be ready because the WEG will give us a chance to showcase the Kentucky Horse Park, with which we Americans are very familiar but which is under-appreciated around the world, even though anyone who goes to the park raves about it to the whole world. Hard to believe, but this will be the first time that the WEG has been held outside of Europe since its inception 15 years ago. What a treat.

Eventing has been lucky to have Kentucky as its showcase event since 1978, and I really hope that the WEG will encourage the leaders and riders in other disciplines to use the Kentucky Horse Park as the site for a national championship center that will carry a legacy beyond the WEG. This competition will really be a celebration of the horse, one where all types of horses will be able to participate in the showcase, whether in competition or as entertainment. So be prepared to come for the best horse celebration ever.