The Chronicle of the Horse
April 25, 2009

Craig Thompson headed up a group of riders from the Professional Riders Organization in a press conference at Rolex Kentucky to get the word out about the new group.

Allison Springer, Phillip Dutton, Buck Davidson and Leslie Law were among the riders who joined Thompson to promote the new organization. “We asked ourselves what could we do as riders to make our sport better at every level,” said Thompson.

Some of the group’s priorities include providing a strong, unified voice for upper level, professional riders, encouraging the free exchange of ideas and consensus, increasing professional riders’ representation on boards and committees and establishing programs to increase community awareness and general fan interest in eventing.

“We’d like to get 10 percent of the spectators here [at Rolex Kentucky] to follow the sport throughout the rest of the year,” said Thompson.

“We want to make competing a way to make a living,” said Davidson. “We’d like people to come watch us.”

“We could be criticized as riders for not doing enough,” said Dutton. “We want to do this for the good of everybody in our sport. If an event makes money from a crowd coming in, then entries can be less and the event managers can put money back into footing and other improvements.”

Increasing prize money was certainly on the agenda for PRO, and members are putting up the money to help make that happen.

“The biggest roadblock is getting the money going,” said Dutton. “Each of us has put up a substantial amount of money.”

Two levels will be available for PRO membership, a $150 professional membership and a $35 participating membership.

“It’s not just about us,” said Springer. “We want to improve the sport at every level. There is so much that’s good and positive in the sport, and we want to draw attention to that. We hope through PRO we can be more accessible.”

One example PRO hopes to base their group on is the Professional Bull Riders, but Davidson also referred to NASCAR.

“We want to give back to the fans,” said Davidson. “Our fans are the lower level riders and amateurs. We want to bring more people into the sport.”

Sport is full of ups and downs, and as much as it would be nice to see an “up” coming along some time, it was not to be this weekend. Though Orion looked liked a million bucks leading up to Kentucky, he developed some heat in his right front foot. As a result he was just a touch less than perfect when we jogged up this morning. Just a touch, but enough that we decided to withdraw him from competition this afternoon.

Doing so was terribly hard, especially knowing Orion’s love of the game and the beautiful cross-country course that Kentucky offers. For what it’s worth, however, my socks did match my tie.

Only the very bitter or the very jaded could arrive at Kentucky Horse Park and not be impressed. There is nothing else like it in our sport. Those of us who get to be here in any capacity, be it rider, owner, groom, friend, spectator or vendor, are lucky. For a few days once a year we get to be part of something incredibly special.

For my part, I have been here in a variety of capacities over the years, though not as a rider in a very long time. I have ridden Orion since he was 3-years-old, which is to say for the last seven years. And in some regard or other, every day of every week of every month of every one of those seven years was designed to lead us here. He is the best of friends and I am privileged to be here with him.

It’s odd to think that just yesterday we were at the Fair Hill Horse Trials with Brew doing the preliminary, last night we were fine tuning our dressage and availing ourselves of Jules and Libby Anderson’s amazing hospitality, and now here we are, in Kentucky. Things certainly happen fast. For me, having been around the block a time or two, taking the opportunity to slow down and enjoy the moments that are offered is essential.

For those inclined to see auspicious signs in nature, the day ended with a brief rain shower, then a perfect rainbow framing the park. It could not have been more beautiful.

It’s been hard to post with all that has been happening! Craig has been meaning to update the blog for sometime now, but life is busy!

A quick re-cap…Brew moved up to Intermediate at Southern Pines. He was a superstar and finished 2nd out of a tough field, only beat by a CCI**** horse headed to KY this spring! He jumped around the Intermediate at The Fork as well. He’s never seen anything that hard in his life and took a bit of extra time that kept him just out of the ribbons in 9th place.

Orion has returned to competition after stifle surgery last fall. He was 4th in the Intermediate at Southern Pines and was quite good in the Advanced at The Fork. He’s feeling fit and full of himself. He has made some significant mistakes in the dressage these past two events. After spending a couple days with Jules and Libby Anderson in VA, he and Craig seem to feeling pretty good about the new **** test.

The highlight of The Fork were Craig’s students Coren Morgan and Jalcyn Burke. They were super in the Intermediate and Preliminary respectively, each placing fourth. Both improved their cross country and show jumping performances tremendously from their previous outings. Congratulations!!

Brew is competing in the prelim this weekend at Fair Hill, along with several of Craig’s students, and then we are back to Jules briefly before making the drive to KY. We promise (again) to be better about updating this!

We just finished another awesome two days of dressage lessons with Jules at our farm. It’s been so great to have here on a regular basis. All participants including, Olympians Mara Dean and Penny Rowland, enjoyed her help thoroughly. Our horses are going so much better on the flat and naturally it carries over to the jumps.

We’ll have Jules back again next Monday and Tuesday. Then hopefully again at the end of the month. If you want to get in on the March 16-17 clinic, please email or call ASAP!

It’s hard to believe that winter is actually winding down, but the daffodils suggest that Spring is here. It’s hard to believe that in the last six weeks we’ve hosted the Aiken Eventing Camp, an ICP workshop, two dressage clinics with Jules Anderson, the Aiken Event Horse Sale, competed at six events, and been a part of launching the Professional Riders Organization. Wow!

The camp was great fun. It’s so rare to get to teach people twice a day for five days in a row. Allison Springer, who taught it with me, and I both look forward to doing it again. Karen O’Connor does a great job conducting the Instructors Certification Program. Having her input, as well as the input of the other instructor participants, has definitely made me a better teacher, though I think I speak for all of us involved when I maintain that simplifying and shortening the process would make it more attractive.

Jules is on her way to the airport as I write. Her help has been tremendous to me with my own horses, and it was great fun to watch her help Mara Dean with Nicki Henley. I’ve known Nicki Henley since importing him as a five year old, and now he’s on his way to being a dressage horse — what a great follow up to such an illustrious eventing career!

The weather forced us to consolidate the Sale into one day, which worked great. By all observations it is a buyers market, and there were plenty of nice horses to try. Though we’ve already been to six events this year, in another ten days it will be nine events! I’m especially looking forward to Southern Pines next week. It’s long been one of my favorites and this year we have the added bonus of attending Will Faudree’s retirement party for his horse Antigua.

Just a year ago the idea was hatched to form the Professional Riders Organization, or PRO. It’s hard to believe that PRO now exists! I encourage everyone to visit the website, professionalriders.org, and get to know the organization. There is so much good work to be done, and now we have a structure in place to do it!

Dressage lesson with Allison

After a great week the Camp has drawn to a close. Four of the riders will compete tomorrow at the Sporting Days Horse Trials, two in the Novice, two in the Beginner Novice. A fifth will compete next weekend at Pine Top in the Preliminary.

From my perspective as a coach and teacher, it was a great week. Starting Monday with Abigail Lufkin addressing the mental game of riding and competing provided a perfect touchstone throughout every lesson. At the end of the day we have to match our mental skills with our physical skills. In my experience this is poorly understood by amateurs and professionals alike. All too often I hear negative self talk when positive self talk would be so much more constructive.

At the beginning of the week Allison Springer, who shared the teaching with me, and I evaluated each of the riders. We then decided to either weight the individual’s lessons towards the dressage or the jumping, though every rider did quite a bit of both. Allison taught dressage each day. I taught the jumping each day and took everyone to Gibbes Farm for a cross-country school on Thursday. Friday provided one last chance to get everyone tuned up before the event. For those that were jumping this meant a walking a newly set show jumping course, warming up like we were at a horse show, and jumping a round. We then talked about how to improve the round and did it a second time. I call this “playing horse show.” It’s a great way to put our skills to the test while simulating the competition experience.

Dr. Christiana Ober and Katylou Gray brought their extensive knowledge of vet care and equine massage to the camp, and by the weekend it was even warm again. All horsemanship aside, however, I expect that I’m not alone in thinking that with the camp over, I’m going to miss Sarah’s breakfasts every morning the most!