In a few years, when we look back at the World Championships in Germany this summer, we may say that was the moment when we changed the way we think about winning at the international level.

We have to face the facts and admit that we’re not playing at the gold-medal level right now. In the past 22 years, we’ve only won the team gold medal once in the World Championships and once in the Olympics–in 1984 and 2002. Yes, we’ve won a lot of other team medals and individual medals, but we’ve never been able to cross the line to be continuously in play for that top spot.

This is not a criticism of the riders who represented us this summer. If there had been one little difference in a moment anywhere along the line by any of them, we would have won a team medal, maybe even the silver. We’re not that far off the path–we have very good riders and several true world-beaters. But we’re missing something.

And I believe that what we’re missing is a total plan. I believe that we need to take a comprehensive look at the complete issue of being competitive on the international stage. We need to look at how we educate our riders at the top level and at the developmental level, and we need to take a similar look at how we can provide a pipeline of horses that’s consistently good every single year.

First, let’s look at the riders. I’ve written previously that we need to invest in a new program to develop the riders of the future, and I believe this needs to be a two-pronged effort. At one level we need to reach out to the lower levels to develop real horsemanship across a broad reach of already targeted riders. Then we need to select the top few riders and get them into an international-caliber program to continue their education–in training horses correctly and in competing internationally.

The trick is that this won’t have a huge effect on the short-term issue of international competitiveness, but it will definitely have an effect in the long term.

Unfortunately, it’s a reality of the political world that investment in the future is the hardest program to sell, because people don’t see the benefit immediately, especially what-ever benefit there is to them. But we still need to do it.

I really wonder if we’re providing the correct level of education vs. competition pressure to our current riders. I don’t really want to suggest that it’s time to re-create the past, but we should recall that the success we had in the ’90s really came from the fact that most of us riders (including me and my wife, Karen O’Connor) were living in England for a good part of the year then. I’m not suggesting that we need to send everyone to Europe en masse, but we should certainly encourage individual riders to spend more time in the heat of competitive pressure for an extended period at some point in their career.

I know this kind of commitment requires considerable personal sacrifice, but riders have to understand that there is a price to pay, sometimes more than once, for playing at the top level. So you have to ask yourself, are you willing to pay the price? It’s not all about money (although that’s an issue). It’s about lifestyle, personal time and relationships.

The ’90s was a time when some of us made a very big commitment to raise the competitive bar. Our riders today have a similar level of mental commitment, but I wonder if they’re willing to pay the total price, as we did?

The second issue is the horses our riders are riding. I truly believe that we’re not thinking correctly along these lines. We Americans are looking for the instant fix, looking to buy a made or almost-made horse we can compete immediately. This is only a short-term answer, and it may be the only answer we have as we look ahead to the World Equestrian Games in Kentucky in 2010, because we’re already a bit behind the game for that competition.

But for the long term, I believe that we must encourage more riders to buy multiple young horses as 4-year-olds. Yes, it’s a numbers game at that age, as at least 75 percent of those horses won’t make it to the advanced level. But the ones who don’t can be sold to compete at the level where they’re comfortable to financially support the horses that do proceed all the way up the ladder. This is what our European competitors do, and I don’t see why we’re trying to do it differently.

European horses are the rage among our riders. Why? Why aren’t American riders competing U.S.-bred horses? Can we not find agents here who can find horses for our top riders to look at? If not, then there’s no shortage of things we can do.

We can entice our breeders by riding and thus promoting their progeny, thus advertising their mares and stallions. If we can get the top young horses into the hands of our best riders, then those stallions and mares are going to become more famous and desirable.

Right now, most of the best young horses end up in the hands of riders who, although their intentions are true, don’t honestly have the ability to produce young horses to their potential.

I believe we can make lots of deals to get this done.

The breeders will benefit because their horses are going to get promoted. The riders will benefit because they’ll be riding better horses and because their daily training and competing of these horses will continually challenge their instinctual skill level.

I’m not asking that breeders give up all of their horses, because the odds are that only a small percentage are top-class horses. It’s only the cream of the crop that we’re looking for. The financial benefit is that their breeding program would get promoted, making all of their young horses more valuable.

This will have to be a multi-faceted approach. The leaders of all of our organizations, from the U.S. Equestrian Federation to the USET Foundation, to the U.S. Eventing Association, are going to have to work together to develop an all-encompassing program that will put the U.S. team on the map for the 2010 WEG and for the years beyond.


David O’Connor