I waited until the closing day to enter the Morven Park CCI* (Va.) this year. I’m a bit superstitious about even telling anyone I’m headed to a three-day because I fear that guarantees my horse will go lame. Ten years ago when I did my first three-day, a closing-day entry would’ve landed me on the wait list for an event that might have 60 competitors or more. This year I received an e-mail assuring me that Morven would still run the long format CCI, even though entries were sparse, but the initial jog would be Friday instead of Wednesday. No need to schedule two full days of dressage for a handful of horses.
   
Since I started eventing 20 years ago, the sport’s changed tremendously, and the introduction of the short format is the most obvious. Many vocal people insisted eventing would never be the same without roads and tracks and steeplechase, but just four years after the change, the few remaining long format events in this country are running at a huge loss with barely any entries. Where are the people who defended the traditional three-day so vigorously?
   
These few entries are a sign that eventing has changed, and there’s no going back. Decades ago, riders received bonus points for finishing under the optimum time. An event horse needed bravery and endurance, and dressage was pretty much optional.
   
Compare that to eventing today, when the lead article in our Eventing Issue focuses on how to identify and prevent dangerous riding (p. 8). Eventers may always be a bunch of “crazy yahoos” to their counterparts in hunters and dressage. But the sport is currently going through an identity crisis, and in the future, I believe “Safety First” will become eventing’s motto. It had better, because if that doesn’t happen, then between the bad press and our litigious society, there won’t be anyone left willing to run an event.
   
It’s easy to get bogged down in the details of change. Events are different these days. The jumps look different and so do the courses. Kids don’t grow up riding outside or foxhunting. Top riders are professionals who ride 15 horses at a single show instead of dedicated amateurs with a few good horses. Events must run on smaller and smaller parcels of land. But if we’re going to continue eventing into the next century, then we can’t afford to sit back and complain about how the sport isn’t what it used to be. Instead, we’ve got to embrace change and methodically tackle the issues so that eventing can continue evolving to fit the needs of today’s society.
   
I’m sad that people aren’t entering long-format one-stars any longer, but I understand why, and while I hope they don’t disappear altogether, it wouldn’t surprise me if they did. Every now and then I ask myself what would have to change in eventing to make me stop loving the sport, and as long as we still jump solid jumps on cross-country, organizers continue running events for love, not money, and eventers remain the kind of people who look out for each other and put their horses first, then the heart of eventing is still alive, no matter what change may come.

Sara Lieser