Second salvo in an excellent Young Adult series for horse afficionados

Let me state at the outset that this is a rip-snorting tale and an overall fun read. The author is very proficient in his craft and there is little to quibble about the structure, pace, language, and overall writing of this book. I continue to be impressed with the quality of the writing and rhetoric.

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As a child, I found Farley’s Black Stallion series to be thoroughly dull. Royce brings a detail, and supplies historic context, in a way that should be interesting to any reader. When next I have the chance to observe dressage I will bring with me a touch more understanding of the art, thanks to the author of this book.

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I’m greatly looking forward to the eventual conclusion of this series, and expect that the trilogy will become at least a minor classic, if not a more respected work over time.

Tally ho!

The Sports of the World Equestrian Games Represent the History of Civilization by John Royce.

Last week, the president of the title sponsor of the 2010 World Equestrian Games (WEG) uttered these words: “We need help and people to step up and tell the story.” Being someone enamored of equestrian sports, I’d like to oblige with a few posts to the reason for all the commotion: the all-important spectator.

Of course there are plenty of media in attendance to ‘tell the story’ of the Games, but what can be missed is a focus on those not fully intimate with the goings-on of horse sports. Context is needed! There is a great gulf in equestrian sport between the experienced campaigner and layman recruit, and misunderstandings abound, so maybe some ‘color’ commentary would be in line.

First: To Be Fair

There are complaints about the runup to the WEG: ticket prices are too high, there’s too much focus on the organizing and not the sports, the horses seem to have been lost in the scramble … so maybe there’s a better light to put on proceedings.

The WEG is a new, world-encompassing, first-time event for the USA. Right now the organizers are busier than the proverbial ‘long-tailed cat in a roomful of rocking chairs’ dealing with the organizational chaos a major horse event presents. It is a real feat to pull off a big equestrian competition; there are many moving parts including not just the horses and their needs (trailer access, stalls, shavings, feed, equipment storage, manure disposal, turnout, grooming and wash areas, schooling rings, competition fields and arenas) but also those of the equine “staff” including riders, grooms, trainers, grounds crew, veterinarians, farriers … not forgetting the facility maintenance (and personnel) and of course sponsors, volunteers, announcers, owners and media. It boggles.

Multiply these logistics times eight separate sports, and the uncomplaining spectator can easily be pushed to the back of the line. Yet the WEG is meant as a spectator event, and if we mere onlookers seem to be crowded in back, let’s be patient and find some fun in the circus. It is there!

The WEG is Something Old, Something New

Horses have been with mankind since before we began the journey of civilization, and watching horses is one of mankind’s most ancient pastimes … yet modern equestrian sports are surprisingly young. In fact, most of the sports seen at the WEG only appeared on the scene with the rise of a broad middle-class in the present era.

Jumping in particular is very new — younger than any of America’s major spectator sports — both Show Jumping and Eventing are still evolving and learning to serve an audience. Dressage is indeed very old, but its expansion into musical Freestyle has caught the imagination of a new generation. The baby of the group, Reining, was first included in the 2002 Games in Spain.

The Importance of Spectators and the WEG

One difficulty with attracting the public is that horse sports have an image of seeming elitist, having been the exclusive domain of aristocracy for thousands of years. Today this is not a true image — horse riding is accessible to the wider public, and the horse itself is without pretension — but it is a remnant of the past even new equestrian sports must face.

Something also quite new in equestrian sports is the unfamiliarity of the general public with horses. People simply don’t know horses like they used to, and have to be introduced to the challenges and excitement of horse sports. In fact, educating the public about horses is a supreme opportunity for the WEG, and makes its success even more important. Equestrian sports have the potential to keep the horse with us into the future, and deserve public support.

Next up: The Sports of the WEG

Well of course they are yawning. You don’t get your Olympic thrills through eventing dressage, which is only more interesting than attractively-drying cement if it’s being done wrong. Olympic thrills are found on the next day, the Cross-County. Someone should have told the spectators, or at least the media. There is so much confusion in the world.

It is actually understandable that equestrian sports are such an oddity to the public, in spite of humanity’s millennia-old partnership with the animal. An unitiated person would naturally assume modern equestrian sports have all existed since ancient times–in fact some of the most popular and exciting are hardly a century old.

It is an amazing bit of historical timing that an ancient skill like horsemanship was perfected to point it could conceive of athletic sports like 3-Day and Jumping … at the same time as the invention of automobiles. And today we have more horses than ever before.

Dressage, however, is truly as ancient as people assume all horseback riding is. It is a proven method of schooling horses that is at least 2500 years old. The origins were the battlefield, where discipline and athleticism were vital to cavalry success. Dressage is a gymnastics program for developing the horse’s physical abilities, and equally importantly, develops positive state of communication between the horse and rider. The system is utterly humane, to the degree of emphasizing only natural movements and requiring the horse be calm and relaxed at all times. Dressage is, in words of modern culture, the Jedi force that animates horsemanship. It is art, and there is magic in it.

Like all the arts, Dressage was lost with the decay of Western civilization during the Dark Ages. European Horsemanship disintegrated into barbarity as humanity lapsed into bestial conditions. The re-discovery of the ancient Classical art of Dressage was part of the earliest flowering of the Renaissance which sparked our current age.

There are multiple levels of dressage and as the levels go higher, the horse begins to develop more expressively until his gait becomes dancing. Some say dressage is like ballet, and as an educated art it is, though since dressage pre-dates ballet by over a millennium perhaps it is more accurate to say ballet is like dressage. (Dressage is also older than Classical music, that upstart.) The highest standard is the Grand Prix, exemplified in the competitive display of the Olympic Games. High level Dressage is a cultural event, as it was in the original Olympics themselves.

So that judge’s stand only looks like a bookie’s window, racing fans. I think the media gives too little credit to Hong Kong’s citizens. When Dressage is put to music at the final Freestyle, even racing fans may see the sparks which ignited the Renaissance.

We have chosen to honor the “Olympics,” but there were actually four major Grecian Games, the Olympian, Pythian, Nemean, and Isthmian. These were held in yearly cycles, so that the largest Games near Olympia were held every four years. The equestrian events were the most popular and religiously significant. The contests included flat Racing, Dressage and Chariot Racing (today the sports are Dressage, Eventing and Jumping). Note that Dressage is the definition of “classical.”

The fact that the ancient Games were religious in nature has given a special moral character to the modern Olympic movement. There were two sports in the original Games: Athletics and Equestrian. Each type of competition held a specific meaning. Athletics represented the striving for human excellence, and Equestrian events represented man’s survival and conquest against the elements.

Inclusion of horses ennoble the Games, and the honorary aspect of equestrian sport is the origin of the famous “Olympic spirit.” The integrity of the Olympic ideal is upheld in the equestrian sport above all, for it is the horse which competes for no prize except the joy of taking part, and horsemanship which puts the mount’s welfare higher even than the Olympic rewards of money and fame.