Following Canada's Equestrian Team

There was a big party at the hotel I’m staying at the night of the German Team gold in dressage. There were actually 2 separate parties…..a German and a Dutch, but it didn’t take long for those to meld into one big lovefest. Here’s a fun video that I came across on Youtube. At the forefront are Isabell Werth, Heike Kemmer and Hinrich Romeike (double gold medalist from Eventing). In the background you can see Imke Schelleken-Bartles.

Yep, you heard it right. Ashley made history tonight by becoming the first Canadian dressage rider to make it into the Grand Prix Freestyle…..the top 15! It was a real nail-biter of a night and I can honestly say I haven’t seen dressage this exciting my entire life. In honour of tonight’s exciting showdown and to show my Canadian spirit, I wore the infamous pyjama pants complete with tattoos on my cheeks (face that is!)

The setting was perfect for a great night of competition. The evening was cool with a nice breeze and a full moon. Perfect. The first surprise of the evening was a last minute withdrawal of Imke Schenkel-Bartles and Sunrise. They were replaced by Australia’s Hayley Beresford and Relampago. The beautiful black Lusitano stallion had the biggest neck I’ve ever seen but boy was he elastic! His passage was incredibly impressive and his legs stretched sideways forever in sweeping half-passes. Lovely.

Yes...I wore the pyjama pants! (l-r) Mary Brooks (Jacquies mom), me and Anne Welch (co-owner of Gran Gesto)

the infamous cartoon horse! the bane of many a rider and horse

the judges take their positions

....and the media take their positions

Great Britain watches Laura Bechtolsheimer and Mistral Hojris ride to a 67.160%

a full moon rising over the international flags

(l-r) Marriette Whithages, the Infanta and Princess Benedickte

check out those lenses!

Spanish rider Juan Manuel Munoz and Fuego XII rode to a 16th place on 68.160%

Ashley and Pop Art had a running total in the 70's for much of their ride

the look of sheer determination.....

Dutch riders Hans Peter Minderhoud and Edward Gal look on

USA rider Steffen Peters and Ravel put in a gorgeous test and earned 71.80%. This pair were a real treat to watch and Ravel was one of the most elastic and flowing horses there.

Sjef Janssen watches from the podium as Anky and Salinero take the stage.

Salinero did not seem to have the same elasticity and flow as Ravel or Satchmo....and unfortunately broke twice in the second trot half-pass

British rider Emma Hindle put in a solid performance on Lancet to earn 70.440%. The Hanoverian stallion was the former ride of Schellekens-Bartels but was sold to Hindle following the 2004 Athens Olympics.

one German rider goes in while the other goes out...Isabell Werth passes teammate Heike Kemmer on the way to the ring.

Isabell was having the ride of her life, working on a record breaking score. At this point, her average was over 83%! It was obvious that they were in a league all on their own.

Isabell's 83% stayed until the first piaffe when Satchmo all of a sudden hit the bit and flew backwards. It was scary because it almost looked like they were going to leave the ring at C! Luckily Isabell was able to get things back on track but it was costly and dropped their score substantially. But they still won the test....it really was an unbelievable test with out of this world half-passes and transitions. Wow.

the media scrum for Heike and Isabell

Heike giving an interview

Heike and Isabell try to make their way through

time to get to bed after a superb night of nailbiting dressage. Notice the rings in the background getting doused by a very high-powered and far-reaching sprinklers

Some random memories on tonight: hearing the cameras click in unison during the two-tempis; hearing the crowd reaction every time a horse happened to poop while doing his test (judging from their reaction, you would think that the horse/rider should be given extra points!); being on the edge of my seat not only during Ashley’s ride, but every ride after until she had the 15th position secured (man was that ever stressful for me!); marvelling in Steffen Peters’ amazing ride on Ravel…easily the most visually striking combination in the ring that night; being absolutely wowed by Isabell and Satchmo and their technical prowess in the ring – they were the definite masters tonight even with their bobble.

I was able to do some more touristy stuff yesterday. Myself, Jenn Miller (dressage vet), Grit High (Eventing’s chair of high performance) and Mike Gallagher (team leader) made the trip via MTR to see the Big Buddha.

The Buddha is on Lantau island near the airport and is the world’s tallest outdoor seated bronze Buddha. The statue is located near Po Lin Monastery and symbolizes the harmonious relationship between man and nature, people and religion.

I feel like I’m getting to be an expert with the MTR system here. Once you get the hang of it, it’s actually pretty easy to use. The biggest concern is knowing which MTR card to use (Urban=yellow and New Territories=green). So as we approach the turnstiles, you’ll hear a shout from the first person to go through “Yellow!”. More often that not what immediately preceded this shout was using the wrong card and hitting the turnstiles full force with your hips – ouch! Eventing farrier Chris Volk was so confident that he was using the right card that he nearly did a flip over the turnstiles 🙂

Once you get there, you have a choice of either taking the cable cars or taking a bus. I knew I had no choice but to do the cable cars. Last year when I was in Rio Al gave me major grief for chickening out on seeing Sugar Loaf because I was too afraid to take the cable car. That was a 30 second ride……this one was over 15 mins! But I sucked it up and did it. It wasn’t too bad except for one stretch where you were up incredibly high….with the clouds around you….and the wind picking up so that the car was doing a gentle sway back and forth.  But you have to do one thing a day that scares you, right? If that’s true, then I racked up about a month’s worth in that one cable car ride.

the view from the start....at this point I was seriously questioning my judgement

getting ready to hop onto the car

my happy calm exterior belies the butterflies that were having a party in my stomach at this point

Mike trying to spot the airplane which had our Eventing horse passengers on their way back home

made it! the stores at the top of the hill.

a whole lotta stairs

a breathing break for me cleverly disguised as a photo op

I think this was another cleverly disguised photo op 🙂

....and another

the view from atop

the trip back down

Dr. Jenn

Mike striking a Buddha pose.....

the unbelievably immaculate subway cars

still trying to figure out why you need to use your MTR card to leave the subway system

at the last station!

a fun photo from Dr. Jenn

I’m woefully behind in my blog postings….sorry everyone! It’s been difficult to find the time to sit down, go through pictures, and collect some coherent thoughts. By the time I get to my room, my comfy bed looks a lot more inviting than the hardback chair in front of the laptop. 🙂

Last night was the first competition for the Jumpers and the stands were packed. As you probably all know by now, Team Canada did a superb job with Mac and Eric jumping clean, Jill with 1 time fault and Ian with an unlucky rail (looks like In Style barely tapped it with his hind hoof). I was surprised to see that a lot of the jumping powerhouses had faults (either rails or time or both). I’m still trying to figure out how the different jumping classes work and I’m pretty sure that last night was to determine a) who qualified for the nations cup and b) the order of go. So I don’t think that the faults carry forward which is too bad in a way because Canada is tied for second with Brazil and Switzerland! Canada will be second last in the order of go for tomorrow night’s team competition with the USA being the last. If last night was anything to go by, it should be an incredible competition.

a wide look at the visually beautiful course

interesting that the jumbotron would onlly show the Beijing Olympic logo during a jumper round yet for dressage it shows live footage of their test and scared many a horse as a result......does not seem too fair to me

some Aussie colours

Saudia Arabia had a full team competing and there were also individuals representing United Arab Emirates, Jordan and Egypt.

Ukraine fan showing her support

on deck at the ingate. In the bottom right corner is US dressage rider Debbie McDonald and her groom Reuben

lots of fans out!

course designer Leopoldo Palacios

a Hong Kong flag in the midst of a packed stand

.....I had camera envy

an example of the beautiful Chinese-themed decorations

one of the many ringside tv cameras

Team Great Britain watches Tim Stockdale's round

Prince of Saudi Arabia checking out the Showjumping action. Saudia Arabia had a full team competing.

Canadian showjumping team watch intently as Jill Henselwood and Special Ed take their turn on course

everyone in full concentration mode....including my hero Mark Todd. Sadly the Kiwis had a tough go that night with one rider crashing through a jump and another racking up 47 faults.

the half-time show! They might look goofy, but they never fail to get people rushing up to take their pictures. I can

Eric Lamaze and Hickstead were in superb Olympic form with a clear round.

some more Hong Kong fans. When Patrick Lam clinched a clear round, the place erupted in deafening cheers and applause. It was quite something! Patrick was so excited that he threw his helmet up into the air and was doing some major fist-pumping in celebration.

Team Canada on the podium to watch Ian Millar

Ian and In Style looked fantastic with one very unlucky rail....looked like In Style barely touched it with the hindfoot.

capturing all the action for television viewers around the world

Wow is the best word to describe my experience at my first Olympic cross-country. The course was absolutely stunning. The fences were massive with a real Chinese theme. The layout was quite spectator-friendly where you could easily find a few vantage points that would enable you to catch a few jumps. The horses were magnificient and the riding was awe-inspiring. What more could you ask for?

The weather didn’t seem to be a factor. It was overcast for the majority of the competition with rain during the last hour. Definitely ideal conditions, although things did seem to get a bit slick for the last few horses that did the course.

The Canadians looked really fantastic out there. They really attacked the jumps and put in an Olympic effort. Both Kyle and Sandra went clean over the jumps and only incurred time penalties. Selena looked fantastic, but unfortunately pulled a shoe near the end of the course which resulted in Columbo slipping a bit on the footing and running out at a couple of jumps. It’s really a shame because I think had the shoe stayed on, she would have likely only incurred time faults. Mike also had a stroke of bad luck when his stirrup leather came off early on in the course and he had to stop in order to get it back in…..a wise decision considering the course required an aggressive ride. No coasting here! Samantha also looked fantastic but unfortunately had a couple of run-outs and time.

I’m very happy to say that there were no serious accidents and almost everyone made it home. There were 2 big surprises that happened: USA’s Amy Tryon and Poggio II (a strong medal favourite) were taken out at fence # 10 when Poggio hung a leg which caused him to stumble and flipped Amy over his head. Under the new eventing rules, a fall by the rider constitutes immediate elimination. The French team suffered another loss when Jean Renaud Adde and Haston d’ Elpegere also were eliminated….you might have heard that former 2004 Gold Medalist Nicolas Touzaint had to withdraw prior to the dressage when his horse suffered an injury while being lunged.

There were tons of people who came out to see all the action. I got up at 5:30 am, was eating breakfast by 6am and lined up for the shuttle by 6:30am. This got me to Beas River at just after 7am….enough time for the long walk to the first water jump to meet Mike G. who had brought Canada’s chef de mission (Olympic gold medal diver Sylvie Bernier) to check out the sport of eventing. Sylvie had brought her daughter with her as well, who was very excited to get as many photos as she could (Florence, Sylvie’s daugher, takes hunter lessons back home in Quebec). This was their first exposure to Eventing and they were both wowed.

The action began at 8am with Mark Todd the first rider on course. I managed to get a video of him doing the first water jump which he made look like a piece of cake (of course!). Mike G. said that he did the math and the course worked out to a jumping effort on average every 8 seconds. Holy smokes that’s a lot of jumping. Not to mention that the terrain was quite undulating and hilly in places. I bet there will be a lot of tired horses and riders tonight.

Everyone now packs up their gear from Beas River and the exodus begins again back to the Shatin venue where the final stadium phase gets underway tomorrow night. The Germans, Aussies and Brits are incredibly strong, so it will definitely be a photo finish. In the meantime, I’ve been dripping hot, then soaking wet, then freezing from the a/c on the shuttle bus. But never been happier! Till next time….. 🙂

the crowds start to gather around the first water jump at 7:30am

Eventing's High Performance Chair Grit High with Jump's chef d'equipe Torchy Millar

Mike and me showing our Canuck team spirit

evidently I had an overabundance of Canuck spirit.....but I chickened out from wearing the pyjama pants

some Brit spirit!

The cross-country course was actually built on an exclusive swanky golf course....just a couple of weeks ago they were still playing!

check out the huge jumbotron in the background

Mike with chef de mission Sylvie and her daughter

Danish dressage rider Andreas Helgestrand (with paper in front of face) came to watch how things are done on the 'wilder' side

Mike hanging with the media gals: Jenn Ward and Karen Robinson

I'm very happy to say that the horse ambulance never moved from this spot during the entire competition

to truly appreciate the monstrosity effect of this jump, you really need to be standing in the ditch

The Great Wall of China.....cross country style!

this one's for you Al!!!

my new British friends

fixing divets between horses

next time I'll be brave enough to wear my Canadian jester hat with bells

check out the chinese lanterns...a nice added touch

absolutely stunning carved dragon combination

chef de mission Sylvie Bernier, team leader Mike G and me

heads up!

waiting for the bus for the trip back home....