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Captain...or Skully
climber
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How DID this get all equestrian, anyway?
The horse does all the work, there. Can YOU jump those barriers?
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apogee
climber
Technically expert, safe belayer, can lead if easy
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"Only in the last thirty years has it got this extreme, where wealth and power trump most all newcomers"
Kinda like politics that way, eh?
Sort of?
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Actually OntheEdge, Jan Ebeling (the rider involved with the silly Romneys) is a terrific rider.
What I was kind of pointing out was something that does not occur to most people. And it is this: We have all heard of and seen on the screeen the Spanish Riding School of Vienna. Some even have heard of the classical schools of dressage of Portugal and Spain, possibly seen them too, at bullfights where the horses are just unbelievably nimble and exciting, full of fire and expression, like no other. Almost birdlike or in the style of ballet.
And yet they are not in the Olympics.
And this is a fully accepted fact in the equestrian world. These are largely different schools of riding, which obviously also involves different view on obedience, expression, lightness, flexibility, and historical richness.
For example, these southern schools have produced horses that can canter backwards.
They have produced horses that could do a canter pirouette en levade.
They do many airs above the ground: all of these, the warmbloods could never do.
They have, in other words pursued the original excitement of the baroque art of dressage, originated some five hundred years ago and continuing today in small enclaves. Almost as if it were a samurai art.
And meanwhile, the warmblood was developed in North Europe, from large cart horses bred to thoroughbreds, so a reasonably useful riding horse and not a cart horse came about. This is what we see in the Olympics today. Almost without exception. A large, terrifically power animal that tends not to be light in contact but can lengthen enormously and perform spectacularly in the less compact movements. Usually their piaffes and pirouettes are boxy in comparison to the best of the southern breeds. But at any rate, it is these large horses that we are seeing in competition. Meanwhile the spanish, the portugese and the riders up in Vienna, continue their ancient art and love of that art. Outside of the Olympics. Completely.
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ontheedgeandscaredtodeath
Trad climber
San Francisco, Ca
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Thanks Peter. I don't know crap about horses. Any similarities to aerial surfing in pro competitions? I know there was resistance for long time to those types of tricks.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Oddly, Edge, the 'aerials' in dressage are very very ancient maneuvers, going back, as I said above, about five hundred years. Dressage was a baroque art of fighting from horses. Most of the "Airs Above The Ground" are fighting moves, even though they are also spectacular and the result of miraculous training and partnership between rider and equine.
So, the 'aerial' part of horsemanship in fact precedes current riding. But you are right in that the baroque aspects of this southern horsemanship are ignored, perhaps even "shut out" in the general scheme of modern equestrianism and certainly the Olympics. Kind of gruesome really, since such terrifically advanced horsemanship is also a matter of our history as a people in Europe.
Again, it is the descent from a beautifully modest amateurism into the complexities of professionalism and all the power it can bring to bear. Surfing had its couple of decades having to adjust to aerials and now it is a solid part of wave riding even in comps.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Tami, hugs, and don't forget that Jesse Owen won four Olympic Golds at the Berlin 1936 Olympics much to the total outrage of that big queen, Hitler.
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Jan
Mountain climber
Okinawa, Japan
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Yes, thanks to Peter for all the information!
My only experience with horses has been for wilderness riding. Personally, I never thought of them as particularly smart and they're definitely skittish animals. Given those traits, what some of them can be trained to do is truly amazing for those of us who have owned just ordinary horses.
All of them of course have the ability to kick, bite and stomp at will and they're a lot bigger than we are, so the personality of the trainer has to be compatible with the horse as well.
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crusher
climber
Santa Monica, CA
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Way cool Peter that you are an equestrian - as was I until after college and the costs of doing it in Los Angeles became prohibitive. I was a gymnast and a rider, not Olympic level but good. I miss riding, never found my way back to it here in Los Angeles....for sure a rich person's hobby in the city.
Captain, the horse does NOT do all the work - you've got to be in pretty darn good shape to ride at that level, jump, stay on and guide the horse through leg pressure and hidden signals. Riders need tons of training too...especially in dressage - part of the point of it is never seeing the rider giving the horse physical cues - do you think the horse has memorized the routine?! : ). It's through leg pressure, weight shift, seating posture, slight hand movements, etc. That the rider tells the horse what to do. Think yoga strength. Anybody remember going riding and then being so sore after that you couldn't walk?
If you can put aside the wealth aspect of these events you'll see some pretty amazing athleticism ( both horse and rider).
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juar
Sport climber
socal
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"If you can put aside the wealth aspect of these events......."
many alot less kind ways of stating that
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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I have a dressage horse she costs less per month than gas.
Pardon me for doubting that your horse and trainer qualified for the Olympics, like Ms. Romney.
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Wayno
Big Wall climber
Seattle, WA
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In spite of all the bullshite some performances do shine through and manage to inspire people.
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Todd Eastman
climber
Bellingham, WA
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A professional climber grousing over the loss of amateurism in Olympic sports?
Shorter and the running guys were living on nothing, making money for the organizers and finally called crap on the amateur status deal. The Olympics with sponsorship are more egalitarian than the games of the late-19th and early-20th centuries where almost all athletes were from the ruling classes.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
merced, california
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Dara Torres, the Hans Florine of the 50-meter? A CLONE!?
I would never have thought that.
A Country Club Thouroghbred, certainly: $100,000/year in costs for training-related help like professionals who allow her body greater flexibility, etc.
A pity the poor kid who hasn't the chance to swim has to take it out on the basketball hoop.
Peters, is it true that the person who has the record for competing in the most Olympics is an equestrienne: some Mountie from Canada, eh.
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Lennox
climber
just southwest of the center of the universe
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I'm pissed....was watching the Olympic Track and Field Trials and they broke away to country club clone Michael Phelps winning a butterfly race. Can you tell the swimmers and gymnasts apart from each other? A track and Field medal is truly an accomplishment. The sport is egalitarian and is practiced in all countries and by all ethnic and socio economic groups. Too many olympic sports are not available to the masses and they are precisely the ones that get the most press in this country.
Donini
What is with all the horseshit in this thread?
Donini, whose politics I generally agree with, makes an ass, not a horse out of himself with his OP.
Read the wiki bio of MF, read up on the lives of the gymnasts.
Javelin, hurdles, pole vault--yeah, anyone can practice that ? ? ?
Anyone with some water can practice swimming, and anyone with some floor space can practice enough for a basic floor routine, just as anyone can practice running and jumping.
If you want to whine about networks cutting from your chosen activity to another hard-won activity, slow down, take a deep breath, and don't frame it as elitism unless it's dressage they switched to.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Well, dressage is done all over the world at a grassroots level, and has real and deep attachment especially for the Spanish and the Portugese whose men, young and old, participate in it as if was something that ordinary working men love to do, like our men like baseball or football. I mean it is endemic in these cultures, being an integral part of their versions of the bull fight, the Rejoneo of Portugal. For them it is a manly art and thus popular and common and accessible. They use dressage in their bullfights in spectacular and symbolic ways, dealing with the bull. For the Portuguese who never kill their bulls but tire them completely then have a crowd of children jump on them with a covering tarp, their rejoneo is quite a bit more attractive than those up north where the bull must be slaughtered.
And there are legendary arena horses, horses of such majesty grace and intelligence , that when they are finally retired, are let loose in the arena, at last at liberty to run undirected in their place of performance, manifesting riderless their own magic and power, and now,their freedom, this all to huge ovations and tears and desperate love raining upon them from the enchanted spectators. So, to some extent dressage has a very very large faction that is significantly grassroots and actually wildly popular, but this faction never emerges in Olympic/FEI shows, what with the current fascination with giant northern horses.
Tami, horses are, well, uh, perhaps less smart than thou. Their brains are about the size of a walnut. I am still holding hopes your hat size is at least a 6-3/4.
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philo
Trad climber
Somewhere halfway over the rainbow
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Whew! Thank gudness. I was worried that this thread was about climbing wall companies producing replicas of a Castle Rock classic. Saved by the Dressage.
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Tobia
Social climber
Denial
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Equestrian sports, including the sports in the Olympic Games are not as elitist as you might think.
Approximately 34% of horse owners have a household income of less than $50,000 and 28% have an annual income of over $100,000. 46% of horse owners have an income of between $25,000 to $75,000.
There are 9.2 million horses in the U.S., with almost 3 million involved in show and dressage sports. Around here there are groups that take underprivileged kids and get them involved in the same events as those in the Summer Games. Dressage, show jumping and combined training.
And Michael Phelps certainly didn't come from the Country Club elite. His mother, a single mom is or was a middle school principal.
I enjoy the track and field events as much as J.D. and hate it when the cut from one event to another because of the commercial interests. Blame it network tv and not the sports.
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kc
Trad climber
the cats
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Hmmmm. Sports may have access issues in America, but there are tons of country around the world that screen kids and place them in sports where they can excel, regardless of their socioeconomic background. And, I also do believe, that there are plenty of sports 'stars' in America, professional and amateur, in sports that are difficult to access that come from disadvantaged backgrounds. My English teacher always told me (bit of irony there) to be wary of the 'gross generalization'.
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Peter Haan
Trad climber
San Francisco, CA
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Tobia I agree. Horsemanship on its face is not necessarily elitist or expensive at all. As your figures point out. And amazingly widespread interest is maintained worldwide. But to take a horse to Federation Equestre International (FEI) levels and Olympic levels, requires, more and more now, a type of animal currently of interest in judging and a hell of a lot of money and time. But these goals (FEI etc) are only one kind of horsemanship as you say.
During the Rejoneo, a classical Capriole:
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