Baron Hans Von Blixenfinecke the Art of Riding Videos

When it comes to eventing, I long agone crossed the line between hobby and obsession. My obsession with eventing is full. It has been my constant companion for well over half a century. Information technology has served as a steady source of learning nigh our honey horses, a guide, a goal, a stimulant and—occasionally—a scourge. In February, my inquiry for a spoken communication I gave at the International Eventing Forum acquired me to look back over the history of our sport with thought-provoking results.

A New Millennium's Challenges
We have all heard the somewhat store-worn precept that we must study history in club non to repeat the mistakes of the past. I think we concord that eventing has changed and that it will (and should) go on to do so, but those modifications must be advisedly considered. Occasionally, we have fabricated these changes with the best interests of humans in mind, and our horses accept come out second-all-time. If wisdom is the apprehension of consequence, then we must pray for wisdom as the new millennium unfolds before us. Our horses are silent partners in this endeavour, and for their sakes we must give serious consideration to the consequences of futurity change.

The sport of eventing, now a century one-time, has shown an ability to change and adjust that it will need in the coming years when the sport will be challenged as never before. Strong societal forces are demanding an increased emphasis on the welfare of our horses, demands that I personally welcome and support. The safety and welfare of our riders have besides come to the forefront of recent discussions. Eventing has received a spooky warning that neither rules nor mastery tin entirely guard us from hazard. We all wish for a speedy and complete recovery from the life-threatening injuries suffered by some of the most adept and elegant practitioners of our art.

Rules Tell a Story
The rules of any sport define its requirements and provide a level playing field for our athletes, 2-legged and, in the case of equestrian sports, four-legged. Eventing'south regulatory bodies—national, international and global—are currently increasing the rigor and complexity of the rules that guide us. Considering the changes in our rules reflect the development of our sport, it is an interesting assay to track the dominion changes that take occurred over the past century, determine the reasons for them and observe the resulting impact.

Eventing has been part of the Olympic movement for more than a century. Although eventing was on the Olympic calendar at Stockholm in 1912, my review begins with the 1924 Paris Olympics, the kickoff to use the format that nosotros now refer to as the "Archetype." By this I mean a dressage test, followed by a 5-phase speed and endurance test (Phase A, roads and tracks; Stage B, steeplechase; Phase C, some other roads and tracks; Phase D, cantankerous land; Stage East, cool-down), culminating on the terminal day with a show-jumping test. This basic format would remain in use for the next 80 years. Also of note: The rules and format for the contest as a whole remained basically unchanged from 1924 until 1948 while the dimensions and speeds used for the cantankerous-land tests have remained unchanged for a century.

Civilians, and then Women On the Podium
Our next date of interest is the 1952 Helsinki Olympics where, for the first time, some of the men on the Olympic podium were in civilian rather than war machine attire. The reasons were obvious. The global conflagration of World War II was over, war machine budgets were shrinking and the unsuitability of horses for modernistic gainsay had get credible, even to regular army generals. The essential character of eventing also began a gradual change at this time. At the sport'south inception, completion—as opposed to winning—was the competitors' master goal. Why? Normally referred to every bit "The Armed forces," eventing was designed to train young cavalry officers and horses. Carefully prepared and thoughtfully ridden, the Classic event horse was capable of strenuous exertion nevertheless could remain in service afterwards the completion of the event.

However, the competitive nature of mankind began to influence the sport with anticipated results. I view information technology as a straw of what was to come that all iii members of the 1952 Olympic U.S. Eventing Team were mounted on Thoroughbreds as opposed to the cavalry remounts that had typically been used before. Eventing originally used a ratio of 3:12:1 as the basis for the relative importance of the scores for the three disciplines: Dressage comprised three parts of the total score while cantankerous country was 12 parts and show jumping only one office, signifying that its principal purpose was to show that a horse could complete the competition even so remain serviceably sound. Riders and trainers gradually recognized that the ability to ride at speed had a marked effect on their competitive results, and the Thoroughbred offered speed as well as endurance.

From 1924 until 1952, the optimum times on both the steeplechase and the cantankerous land were viewed as unobtainable goals. The individual aureate medal winner at the 1952 Helsinki Olympics, Businesswoman Hans von Blixen-Finecke, riding for Sweden, finished the cross-state phase with only three time faults. By 1956, however, several competitors at Badminton, including Col. Frank Weldon and Sheila Willcox, finished the speed and endurance test without penalty. (Sheila's operation is especially noteworthy; at the time, regular army generals and colonels considered women also weak and timid to be successful event riders. Piffling did they know.)

Speed and More than Speed
The 1960 Rome Olympics provide interesting illustrations of the effect of changes in the rules; teams were now increased to four members with the 3 best scores to count. This change naturally increased the average speed of the steeplechase and cantankerous-state phases. Team strategy of the iv-rider era consisted of sending your slowest, almost dependable horse and rider first; if they were successful, the side by side pair would ride closer to "maxing the course," which in those days referred to obtaining the maximum bonus points bachelor on both steeplechase and cross country, and and then on. At the Rome Olympics, we saw the first double-clear cross-land ride when Laurie Morgan of Australia, riding Salad Days, won the individual gold. The Australian team won a golden medal based in part on their discovery of a legal "short-cutting" on Stage C, which allowed them a considerable amount of time to recuperate before the Stage D start times. This was an advantage considering there was no scheduled rest time before horses and riders started Phase D, the cantankerous-country test.

By 1963, a mandatory 10-minute veterinary examination before the start of the cantankerous-country test was required. As eventing became more and more of a speed competition, the step of change increased as well. Women were outset immune to compete in Olympic eventing in 1964, when U.S. rider Lana DuPont won a silvery team medal at the Tokyo Olympics.

The Influence of Television
In 1967 Stage Due east, the cool-down phase, was removed. That same year, the stadium jump-off rules were inverse to more dramatic and suspenseful "reverse order of placing" in recognition of the growing importance of tv coverage. This rule modify also continued the trend toward increasing the technical expertise required for success in the sport.

Meanwhile, steps were taken to simplify a scoring arrangement that had always been insanely complicated. The old bonus-points system was changed. Now the entire competition was scored on a basis of penalization points, a change whose results again illustrate the Police of Unintended Result. Earlier the scoring system alter, the optimum steeplechase speed to avoid penalties was 600 meters per minute with maximum bonus points awarded for 690 mpm; the cross-country optimum speed was 450 mpm with maximum bonus points awarded for 570 mpm. However, the new system required average speeds of 570 mpm to avoid time penalties. This strongly influenced riders' attitudes toward the steeplechase and cantankerous-land tests. In the mid-1970s, the penalty points for a show-jumping knockdown were raised from v to x and the ratio of the influence of the tests was changed to 3:12:two, thus slightly increasing the influence of the testify-jumping test. (This is in contrast to the current ratio of 1.5:1:i. Again, these changes reflect the ever-increasing levels of technical expertise that eventing requires.)

A Test of the Best
Amongst the next decade'south many changes, the most influential followed the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, when the International Olympic Committee opened the Games to professional athletes. Although the introduction of a profit motive drove competitive pressure to new heights, this change at to the lowest degree had the virtue of honesty. The Olympic motility had existed in a land of hypocrisy from its beginning, and the removal of artificial barriers betwixt amateur and professional person athletes reflected the opinion of guild at large: The Olympics should be the best competing confronting the all-time.

For the next two decades, the Law of Unintended Result was live and well in our sport. For example, increased competitive pressure caused an ever-growing accent on speed. One consequence was improved conditioning of the effect horse, resulting in more than competitors who were able to complete the speed and endurance tests without time faults. At the same time, in an attempt to boring the perceived extreme speed of cantankerous-state riding, the complexity and technicality of form design were increased. The result was to emphasize the flexibility of the horse's step with a concurrent boost in the importance of dressage for the issue horse. However, many observers argued that the trends in design were causing, rather than alleviating, the disastrous series of fatal accidents that occurred with distressing frequency throughout this flow. This word has kept bartenders decorated effectually the world and is one that continues to this day.

New Format, New Consequences
From 1924 until 2004, our format remained essentially unchanged. However, eventing revolutionized itself when the 2004 Athens Olympics utilized a new shortened format, one that independent only dressage, cross-state and bear witness jumping. The numerous reasons for this include a desire to remain on the Olympic calendar, to lessen the space required for the cantankerous-state grade and to provide a format in which horses could compete more often. I mentioned earlier that the Law of Unintended Event rules our sport, and this revolution of our format provides a plethora of illustrations.

In my opinion, one could trace a straight line from the IOC decision in the mid-1980s to open up the Games to professionals to a desire for more competitive opportunities from modernistic-mean solar day professional person riders and their horses. During this time, the same professionals raised the bar of technical expertise to new heights. Our new short format emphasizes competition rather than completion, and our riders and trainers take risen to the new challenges posed by changes to our rules. During the decade since the revolution of eventing, our best horses and riders have attained admirable levels of performance.

In the fall of 2014, the IOC issued an calendar for changes to be implemented by 2020. This document is commonly referred to as the "2020 Memo." (It can exist found athttp://www.olympic.org/Documents/Olympic_Agenda_2020/Olympic_Agenda_2020-20-20_Recommendations-ENG.pdf.) I was going to say that this memo provides the prism through which we must look as we attempt to guide the future. Yet, the apparatus we await through is in reality a kaleidoscope; every fourth dimension we change some part of our sport in an attempt to adjust ourselves to the IOC's imperatives, the Law of Unintended Consequence awakens.

Role of the 2020 Memo refers to downsizing, IOC-speak for cost-saving measures that will be required of various sports if they wish to continue to be included in the Olympic agenda. One of the price-saving measures suggested for eventing is to cut the size of the team from 4 to three riders with all iii scores to count. (It is ironic that, in order to modernize, we should reinvent ourselves as we were 60 years ago when three-member teams were the standard.) The reason for the alter is simple: money. National Olympic Committees provide funding for their various Olympic teams based on squad results, and when all 3 scores are to count, members of teams with three riders are told to finish at all costs. A weak showing at this year'due south Olympics may very well result in a reduction in the team'south funding during the next Olympic quadrennial. Reducing the size of the teams will certainly save coin for the IOC and the organizing committees involved, merely it will as well dramatically reduce the speed that riders utilize during the cross-country competition. Afterward lx years, the accent volition once once more be on completion rather than competition.

Eventing in Today's World
As we continue to interact with the IOC, we must await at the earth equally committee members run into information technology. The IOC has become one of the largest and most successful entertainment businesses in the world. In 2014, the IOC put $3 million back into global sport every mean solar day of the year. The main source of this fabulous wealth, of course, is idiot box. The IOC measures every sport on the Olympic calendar by several metrics, including "universality" (does the sport occur the world over or only in sure places) and television ratings. If your sport does not fit into television'southward parameters, information technology will either accept to change or it will be dropped from the Olympics. This explains the success of eventing'southward change to show jumping in reverse order of placing—because the winner is non determined until the last competitor crosses the finish line.

Beginning with the 1972 Munich Olympics, I worked every bit a idiot box commentator for more than 40 years. During this fourth dimension, I have asked some senior and knowledgeable people in that industry what could brand our sport more goggle box-friendly.

Offset they suggest changing the competitive attire so our athletes don't look like a character from The Phantom of the Opera. And then simplify the scoring system. By this, they practice not say that we should produce different winners just rather that our system should be hands explicable. Idiot box is a distressingly compressed medium, and your time for commentary in each segment of the program is quite short. It is too short, in fact, to explain our electric current organization. Basically, you put a graphic up on the screen and hope your viewers are recording it so that they tin review it later.

Finally, TV experts will add, "While yous are at information technology, change the name." I can hear you groaning from here; this topic is a hardy perennial and to engagement no satisfactory name has emerged. Notwithstanding, the TV experts are right. Sports such as golf and lawn tennis accept succeeded with nondescriptive names, only participants in a boutique sport such as eventing do not accept the luxury of universal recognition.

If I had unlimited time, I could continue at length, describing the ramifications of various proposals for alter. Simply our discussions should consider the essential question: What is our time to come to look like? Will nosotros make every effort to remain in the Olympics? The reply to this question volition make up one's mind the path that eventing takes through the 21st century. As an aside, when he was a newly elected U.S. senator, John F. Kennedy remarked, "At some point, a homo's political party tin can inquire too much." In our context, we must continually consider if the IOC has asked too much of our silent partners. I exercise non think we are at that point nevertheless, just we must remain committed to the idea that our horses mean more to us than the Olympics.

This article originally appeared in the March 2016 result of Practical Horseman.

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Source: https://practicalhorsemanmag.com/training/cross-country-jim-wofford-changing-the-sport-eventing-31316/

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