USHJA Blog - 2010 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games
Meet Our Blogger: Jeannie Blancq Putney
Jeannie Blancq Putney is an avid horse enthusiast who enjoys covering all breeds and all levels of equestrian sport. Jeannie blogged the 2009 & 2010 Derby Finals. As a result, in 2009 USHJA won the American Horse Publications Editorial & Graphics Award for an Equine-Related Blog. She has also covered the World Equestrian Games, World Cup, Rolex Kentucky Three-Day Event, Pony Finals and NAJYRC.

9/29/2010
Worlds are Colliding

The welcome as you walk through the gateOne of the greatest things about a WEG is that there is a definite team spirit and mentality. Yes, I am sure that no one is going to give an individual medal back if they earn it, but the real accomplishment seems to be making a contribution to your country and being able to say you contributed to a win for USA. That was obvious to me in Aachen, and it is obvious here.

The other thing that is SO cool to see is the colliding (maybe mixing is a better word) of athletes from different sports cheering on each other. Yesterday as I was in the mixed zone (for anyone who doesn’t know, this is where the journalists are allowed to ‘mix’ with the athletes and ask a few brief questions right after they jump off their horse) during dressage I was watching USA’s anchor rider warm-up to head into the arena as the final rider. His score was going to mean the difference between a bronze medal and none at all. I noticed something that seemed at first so out of place—cowboys. Tim McQuay and Tom McCutcheon, who had just helped earn team gold for the U.S. (for the third WEG in a row) came down in their cowboy boots, hats, and spurs to cheer on Team USA. I realized that their attire didn’t really make them different. Their red, white and blue and their love for the horse made them integral members of our team and just like everyone else.

As an aside, many of you know Tim’s wife is very active in the hunter/jumper scene, so we do see the different disciplines of our sport really melding together. It’s a great thing. I also noticed the Dutch dressage team in the new indoor arena cheering on Anky van Grunsven as she switched from dressage to reining for this WEG and made an impressive showing as a reiner. To see dressage greats cheering on one of dressage’s greatest in “western dressage” was somewhat moving. That’s the way it should be, and that’s the way it is at a WEG. I am sure it is that way at an Olympic Games as well, but this is way cooler because we’re all members of the horse family.

I don’t think I mentioned in my last blog that our jumping team was here (in its entirety) on day one and mentioned in a press conference they did that part of the reason they were here early was to cheer on the entire team. Pretty cool.

So far team medals have been decided for three disciplines—reining, endurance and dressage. We took gold in reining (again) and just missed a medal in dressage. The U.S.’s dressage team is fairly new so it was certainly understandable. Endurance started out strong, but it’s such a tough sport and the welfare of the horse is always put first. Your horse has to be so incredibly fit and conditioned to finish 100 miles. With the lack of rain we’ve had in Kentucky this summer I don’t doubt that the hard ground had a role in so many horses displaying some level of lameness in the vet checks. A couple of our horses were also disqualified for metabolic reasons at the vet gates, which is also a very common occurrence in endurance.

The welfare of the horse is alive and well at these Games, and I don’t think anyone here would disagree that the animal comes first. You can be sure that these animals are well watched after at this level. For example, yesterday in dressage a Dutch rider was asked to stop during her dressage test because the judges saw blood in her horse’s saliva. It turned out that the horse had just bitten the very tip of its tongue in his test, but of course that meant he was out. It’s too bad that the Dutch rider came all this way only to be disqualified because of a freak occurrence. The horse is okay, and the team did take the gold medal, but what was most important to everyone—including the rider was that her horse was okay.