Today’s course must have been tricky. The time was tight. It started out at 82 seconds allowed, and Lauren was the first in the ring of today’s 119 riders—a TOUGH spot to be in. After Lauren’s round they upped the time allowed to 84 seconds, which was still quite tight for many riders. Rails were falling all over the course and many feet/hooves landed in the water. It was obviously tough and technical. So many of yesterday’s stars didn’t do so hot today. It was quite a different result than yesterday.
Lauren had the last rail come down again—another cheap rail. Mario was next in the order and had a foot in the water and a rail. He might have had his concentration disrupted a little bit by the fact that Urico pulled a shoe in the warm-up, and they had to have a quick visit with the farrier that held them up a bit. Then it was Laura who had a better day today with a more settled Cedric, but he uncharacteristically had a rail in the middle jump of a triple combination. McLain went toward the end of the pack and pulled a rail at an oxer that he said he didn’t even think would be a problem. He said that it was obvious the Americans had a case of four fault-itis today (catchy, and yes, I did steal that saying from him).
Laura said something today that made a lot of sense. She said something like the team would rather have one horrible round and three good ones than a bunch of mediocre rides. Today’s rides weren’t the worst and weren’t the best but weren’t what the Americans had hoped for.
It was another Kentucky-themed course today by Conrad Homfeld. Today’s theme was “Kentucky Racing” and included fences called: Seabiscuit, Track Rail, Keeneland, Starting Gate, Churchill Downs, Tote Board and Winner’s Circle, My Old Kentucky Home, and many others. It was another visually-appealing course that really tied this sixth WEG to its host country.
So I’ve been thinking—does the rider make the horse or the horse make the rider? So many of the European superstars that I watched at the Games in Aachen are here with different horses and are sitting in a very different spot. Granted that could be partly because these are more green horses, and the horses they won on in Aachen were more experienced. Just some food for thought. Many of them as doing well here but certainly haven’t filtered to the top…yet.
For those who are coming out tomorrow—Wednesday—to watch Show Jumping, they have added an extra session. Due to the large number of entries, they’ve decided to split the team finals tomorrow into an afternoon session and a morning session. The 7 p.m. session will include the top 10 teams and individuals (this should be where all the U.S. riders land), and the others will go from 1-5. Just an update on attendance numbers…yesterday (day one of Jumping) saw more than 31,000 people here at the park. Since Jumping was the only thing going on yesterday, I think it’s safe to say those were all loyal Jumping fans!
My pin search continues. I thought I’d have more time this week to search/deal/negotiate/trade, but that hasn’t been the case. A few days ago I asked one of the cameramen from FEI TV about a Team Chile pin, because he had a jacket on that looked like he might know someone on the Chilean team. He very sweetly informed me that the whole pin things is passé and old fashioned and the French especially (I think he said they were the ones who started it) didn’t do that anymore. That explains why, when I went to the French booth that they looked at me like I had three heads when I asked for a pin (I am 99% French so I don’t mean that in a bad way—lots of people look at me that way). However, the Normandy 2014 booth has pins which I was happy to score. The nice cameraman must be humoring me because he found me today and gave me a pin. So I am on a search for some of the more obscure team pins. Seriously, I am not beneath accepting charity so if anyone wants to sign up to be my intern and go around and get me some more equestrian team pins, just let me know!