On Fun Freestyle Day, Grease Is the Word

Danny (Jan Ebeling on Darling) woos Sandy (Charlotte Bredahl-Baker on Chanel) in their winning Grease-themed exhibition pas de deux. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

The dark day of no competition at the 2015 Reem Acra FEI World Cup Dressage Final proved an opportunity for spectators as well as riders to cut loose and show the lighter side of our buttoned-down sport.

Just as many enthusiasts packed the Thomas & Mack Center for today’s Las Vegas Dressage Showcase as attended yesterday’s Grand Prix competition, which drew more than 7,300 spectators. But today was all about music, fun, and costumed exhibition rides – all by California-based riders and horses – plus a couple of milestone tributes.

The midday program kicked off with two “rising star” freestyles, ridden sans costumes: an Intermediate I Freestyle by Sabine Schut-Kery on Sanceo, and a Grand Prix Freestyle by Steffen Peters (who’s contesting the World Cup Final with Legolas 92) on the up-and-comer Rosamunde.

 

Sabine Schut-Kery rides Sanceo in an Intermediate I Freestyle. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

The crowd was “looser” than at a traditional dressage competition, clapping and vocalizing freely during the rides. When Sanceo first entered the Thomas & Mack and spooked at a patch of unevenly dragged footing, the audience laughed; then when the stallion neighed, the crowd responded with a chorus of “awww.”

Light moments aside, Sanceo is a stunner, with tremendous scope and presence. His pirouettes and extensions drew cheers, and Schut-Kery was clearly thrilled with his performance.

 

OK, maybe she's a little too far underneath herself in front. But holy moly, can Rosamunde sit! Steffen Peters and his new wunderkind perform their Grand Prix Freestyle at the Las Vegas Dressage Showcase exhibition. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

The other stunner is Rosamunde. It’s really hard to believe that this mare is only eight years old because her relaxation in the electric environment, coupled with her ease with the demands of the Grand Prix level, belie her age. She was so comfortable in the arena that I only saw her flinch once at some stimulus, and Peters was able to drop the reins and leave the arena on the buckle amidst the thunderous applause after his final halt and salute. Peters is not one to push a horse, and it’s obvious that Rosamunde has not been pushed. She’s extraordinary, and I expect great things from this pair in the future.

 

Not all dressage judging is this much fun! Linda Zang, Stephen Clarke, and Hans-Christian Matthiesen share a laugh with World Cup Finals announcer Bob Tallman (who's a well-known voice in the rodeo world). Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

With those more serious demonstrations concluded, it was time to turn the volume up – way up – for a three-way Dancing with the Stars-style pas de deux competition, complete with celebrity judges. FEI 5* judges Linda Zang of the US, Stephen Clarke of Great Britain, and Hans-Christian Matthiesen of Denmark made up the celebrity panel, awarding their scores via card after each ride.

 

Poison Ivy (Shannon Peters on Weltino's Magic) tries to put Batman (David Blake on Ikaros) under her evil spell. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Each pas de deux was themed, elaborately costumed, and expertly choreographed and edited. First up were Batman and Poison Ivy, aka David Blake on Ikaros and Shannon Peters on Weltino’s Magic. The horses – all of the horses today, actually – handled the atmosphere really well, in fact better than during the much quieter schooling session on Wednesday.

 

The Indian (Anna Dahlberg on Rico) meets the cowboy (Mette Rosencrantz on Marron). Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Then we visited the “Wild Wild West” courtesy of cowboy Mette Rosencrantz on Marron and Indian chief Anna Dahlberg on Rico. The upbeat soundtrack included themes from The Lone Ranger, A Million Ways to Die in the West, and Bonanza. The excitable Marron did give a half-rear during the program, but I think the audience thought it was part of the act! The judges scored the program higher than the Batman performance – but as Clarke (who was obviously relishing his role as the Simon Cowell of the panel) quipped, “Mette has a gun, so I’m going up.”

It was the final pas de deux, however, that brought down the house, winning top marks both from the judges and from the audience applause meter. “Danny” (Jan Ebeling on Darling) pursued “Sandy” (Charlotte Bredahl-Baker on Chanel) to the well-loved songs from Grease. Judge Linda Zang commended the horses’ synchrony and also confessed an affection for the 1950s-style music, saying that “This was my era!”

 

Elvis (Guenter Seidel on Zamorin) is a hunka-hunka burnin' love accompanied by showgirls (from left) Michelle Reilly on Umeeko, Sarah Christy on Xirope, and Elizabeth Ball on Orion. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

The final musical showcase of the exhibition was a “Viva Las Vegas” quadrille. Elvis (Guenter Seidel on Zamorin) was most definitely in the building, accompanied by the scantily clad showgirls Michelle Reilly on Umeeko, Sarah Christy on Xirope, and Elizabeth Ball on Orion. The quadrille wasn’t part of the celebrity judging, but it was the perfect extravaganza to conclude the exhibitions.

Tributes and Touching Moments

Two short, related ceremonies punctuated the otherwise-exuberant Las Vegas Dressage Showcase with a serious note. The first honored the contributions of E. Parry Thomas – yes, of the Thomas & Mack Center – to both Las Vegas and dressage. Thomas, now 94, was a banker who was instrumental in developing Las Vegas as a city and a resort destination. And thanks to the equestrian interests of his wife, Peggy, and daughter Jane, Thomas became a strong supporter of the sport. He and Peggy developed their River Grove Farm in Hailey, ID, where husband-and-wife team Bob and Debbie McDonald became the trainers. The Thomases went on to sponsor Debbie McDonald through their purchases of many top horses, including the legendary Brentina, McDonald’s 2004 and 2008 Olympic mount.

 

Rider Adrienne Lyle (right) helps to lead Wizard from the arena after his retirement ceremony. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

A former working student of Debbie McDonald’s also benefited from the Thomases’ patronage. Adrienne Lyle was given the ride on their Wizard, whose career culminated in performances at the 2012 Olympics and the 2014 World Equestrian Games. The 16-year-old Oldenburg gelding (Weltmeyer x Classiker) appeared in public one last time in full show regalia (quite amped up in the T&M Center) before Lyle dismounted and the great horse was unsaddled, draped with a cooler, and led from the arena.

The tributes were a reminder that without supporters like Thomas and horses like Wizard, who give so much of themselves, dressage would be a pale shadow of the robust and thriving sport we have today. It was fitting that the ceremonies were bookended by the lighthearted and uplifting exhibition rides that, like our horses themselves, brought joy to so many.

Let Them Eat Cake

Celebrating the USDF Instructor/Trainer Program's 25th anniversary. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Unlike with Marie Antoinette, this time the invitation was a welcome one. The occasion: the USDF Instructor/Trainer Program's 25th anniversary. Adequan/USDF Annual Convention attendees, and especially members of USDF's Board of Governors, enjoyed slices of delicious cake during a break in day 1 of the BOG's annual assembly.

Cake wars: USDF members vied for the best angle to photograph the anniversary creation. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

In truth, the break was hardly needed. Once a notoriously contentious governance marathon, the BOG assembly is on track to break speed records for the second year in a row. Today's agenda -- which included reports from USDF's president and executive director, a budget report, and talks by various United States Equestrian Federation officials -- wrapped half an hour early. It left plenty of time for the eagerly anticipated drawings for those most cherished of door prizes, the traditional gift baskets donated by USDF's group-member organizations.

The 2014 USDF Board of Governors assembly. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Beautiful baskets, many displaying state or regional pride, are a cherished BOG tradition. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

The reports and addresses were universally upbeat. According to USDF treasurer Steve Schubert, the USDF is in the black and has been pronounced squeaky-clean by its independent auditing firm. In its second year of existence, the US Dressage Finals attracted 100 more horses than the 2013 edition and are in the black, according to Janine Malone, who chaired the national championships' organizing committee. USDF member and horse-registration numbers are healthy, although some GMOs have seen attrition, a concern addressed in the morning's GMO roundtable discussions, in some committee meetings, and in USDF executive director Stephan Hienzsch's BOG report.

GMO representatives share challenges and solutions at the popular GMO roundtable discussions, Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

The USEF reports were practically fountains of delight. No one can compete with national dressage chef d'equipe and technical advisor Robert Dover when it comes to optimism. Referring to the USEF-USDF relationship, Dover said, "We are putting together a true machine that works together at every single level, from the littlest kids to the highest level." Make no mistake: This man is going to get US dressage riders on the medal podiums or die trying. My own money's on the former.

We heard from USEF president Chrystine Tauber, who praised the USDF's efforts in creating the US Dressage Finals and promised continued support for dressage. Some of that support will assuredly come in the stout, genial form of Will Connell, whom the USEF lured across the pond from the British Equestrian Federation to become its director of sport.

Connell had the BOG delegates laughing at his tales of his days as commander of the King's Troop in the Royal Army, and later as a new employee at the BEF, working to transform a "dysfunctional" British team into the world-beaters they proved to be at the 2012 London Olympics. (In Athens 2004, Connell said, he found Carl Hester in the arena the night before the Grand Prix Freestyle, frantically trying to learn teammate Richard Davison's freestyle. Hester figured his chances of qualifying were so poor he hadn't bothered to create his own freestyle, Connell said.)

Under that pleasant exterior and the hello-old-chap stuff must beat the heart of a ferocious go-getter, however. Most sources give Connell the credit for turning around Team GB's equestrian fortunes, and it's clear the USEF wanted him badly. It will be very interesting to see what Connell does with what he's calling Operation Tokyo, the reference being to the 2020 summer Olympic Games.

All Hail Queen Charlotte!

2014 WEG Grand Prix Freestyle gold medalists Charlotte Dujardin and Valegro (with Norman, the WEG horse mascot, redubbed Freddy by the British team) wave to British fans during their victory lap. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Great Britain’s Charlotte Dujardin and Valegro won everything in sight at the 2012 London Olympic Games, and they’re not stopping any time soon.

The 29-year-old protégé of British dressage veteran (and Dujardin’s 2012 Olympics and 2014 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games teammate) Carl Hester has a lock on the individual WEG dressage gold medals. Today in Caen, Dujardin picked up her second individual gold of the week, adding a Grand Prix Freestyle medal (and a Rolex watch) to the GP Special gold she won on Wednesday.

 

"Blueberry" in piaffe: "He's good at everything," Dujardin said. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

It was a decisive victory, with judges Isabelle Judet (FRA), Lilo Fore (USA), Stephen Clarke (GBR), Francis Verbeek (NED), Elizabeth McMullen (CAN), and Dietrich Plewa (GER) awarding Dujardin and Valegro a score of 92.161 percent over silver medalist Helen Langehanenberg of Germany on Damon Hill NRW (88.286).

 

The 2014 WEG Grand Prix Freestyle medalists: Helen Langehanenberg of Germany (silver), Charlotte Dujardin of Great Britain (gold), and Adelinde Cornelissen of the Netherlands (bronze). Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

From the audience’s viewpoint, it was almost a toss-up as to who would win bronze, Langehanenberg or the Netherlands’ Adelinde Cornelissen. But although Damon Hill looked a bit tired, his supple and harmonious test got the nod over Jerich Parzival NOP’s greater power and flamboyance that occasionally showed moments of tension, earning the Dutch veterans a score of 85.714 percent.

 

Helen Langehanenberg of Germany thanks Damon Hill NRW for his freestyle performance. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

“After London, I didn’t really think it could get much better,” Dujardin said afterward. “But then at the Europeans [Championships], two golds there, and then I focused on my first World Equestrian Games. To win any medal is always a great achievement, but to come away here with two individual golds and the team silver is just unbelievable. I couldn’t have asked for anything more.”

Dujardin, like most riders, is well aware that the best rider in the world can’t do it on a horse that is not at the top of the international standard. She currently sits on the greatest jackpot the dressage world has ever known. Valegro, a twelve-year-old Dutch Warmblood (Negro x Gerschwin), is the Secretariat of dressage. He is more supple, more straight, more ridable, and with greater talent for both extended and highly collected work than any other horse today. The fact that he has an adorable pony face and is called Blueberry is icing on the cake.

Although Dujardin and Valegro have smashed all the high-score records and have nothing left to prove, the rider knows that although getting to the top is hard, staying there is harder.

“The challenge is then to recreate [the success], and try to do it on some other horse, a younger horse. I enjoy training young horses and getting them up to Grand Prix, so maybe I can do it again on another horse,” Dujardin said.

All of the riders who stood atop the medium podium today expressed fierce pride in their mounts. Dujardin said simply: “He’s just good at everything.”

 

Adelinde Cornelissen of the Netherlands describes Jerich Parzival NOP as "seventeen going on seven." Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

“He really deserved a medal today. I’m really proud of him. He just keeps on doing it, over and over again,” said Cornelissen of Jerich Parzival NOP, a seventeen-year-old Dutch Warmblood gelding (Jazz x Ulft). Several times this week, Cornelissen said: “He’s seventeen going on seven.”

Of the medalists today, Langehanenberg gushed the longest about her mount, Damon Hill NRW, a fifteen-year-old Westfalen stallion (Donnerhall x Rubinstein I).

“He can speak and read; he’s something else than a horse,” she said. “Every time, he gets better and better and better. You think that [a performance] was perfect and the best, and then the next time it’s wow, even better. He has no weaknesses; he has perfect gaits, his mind is perfect. He is like a little dog. If he were a little smaller, he’d sit beside us on the sofa. He has the best character someone can have. He’s absolutely honest and he’s the best.”

 

French judge Isabelle Judet, the president of the ground jury for the GP Freestyle. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Although most of the fifteen freestyles today were not mistake-free—most of the horses showed a few signs of fatigue from the long week of competition—French judge Isabelle Judet, the president of the ground jury today, had nothing but praise for the standard.

“We are like the spectators: We just loved it. We had great fun,” Judet said.

All five judges were in agreement regarding the placings of the gold- and silver-medal winners, and there was little discrepancy regarding the bronze, as well.

Said Judet: “When you are in the booth, you are not thinking about the results. We don’t try to do any placing; it just comes out. We’ve had a lot of experience, all of us. [In the moment] we’re almost not thinking; it’s like second nature. We just trust our feeling and that everybody will do their best. Sometimes, like today, it happens that we all have the same idea. It’s not quite always like this, but today we did.”

 

Steffen Peters and Legolas 92 performing their "Under Pressure" freestyle. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Steffen and Legolas: Looking Ahead to Las Vegas

Aboard Four Winds Farm’s twelve-year-old Westfalen gelding, Legolas 92 (Laomedon x Florestan II), Olympic team and WEG individual bronze medalist Steffen Peters expressed satisfaction with today’s “Under Pressure” freestyle, which earned a score of 77.321 percent for tenth place.

“A lot of things worked out great, especially the difficult parts: going from the extended canter to the pirouette, from the pirouette to the piaffe. And when he’s this excited, as he was today, the walk can be difficult. But today he walked absolutely beautifully, very relaxed. I could push him actually a little bit in the extended walk. The collected walk was great; I could actually relax for a moment myself. Then he came very nicely into the piaffe from the walk. Overall, a very good freestyle. I’m super happy,” Peters said. “It’s always the one-tempis that are tricky, but they worked out today. There was one where he was a bit tense, they were not perfectly straight; but I don’t think we had a mistake.”

Of his score, Peters said: “Seventy-seven at the World Games, nothing wrong with that. Of course you’re always hoping in the freestyle that you get a little closer to 80 percent, but we’ll leave that up to Laura today.”

The US dressage-team veteran already has a long-term strategy planned for Legolas: “The next big step is the [2015 FEI] World Cup [Dressage Final] in Las Vegas,” he said. Referring to the very electric atmosphere in the Thomas & Mack Center, with the audience positioned very close to the arena, he said: “It’s obviously a very difficult arena for Legolas, a bit of a nervous horse, but we’ll go there in plenty of time, a few days before, to practice there. Right now he gets a long break, at least four weeks; then we’ll pick up again from there.”

Legolas’s freestyle won’t be quite the same when we see it again in Las Vegas, Peters said. “When we made the music for the freestyle, we made a couple versions of the music. There is room for some new ideas. Those I’ll show you guys in Vegas.”

 

Laura Graves and Verdades have trotted -- make that galloped -- onto the world scene, finishing fifth in the WEG GP Freestyle. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Hello, World, I’m Laura Graves

The 27-year-old American phenom from Geneva, FL, was the talk of the WEG dressage competition. If I had a nickel for every time a foreign journalist asked me what the US press knew about her before the WEG and whether we were surprised that she was doing so well, I’d be considerably wealthier.

Graves’s story has grown more and more remarkable this week. I’d never heard her name before the US WEG selection trials in June. She stormed in and finished second to Steffen Peters on her developing superstar horse, Verdades, a twelve-year-old Dutch Warmblood gelding (Florett AS x Goya), elbowing many decorated veterans aside. She and “Diddy” proceeded to travel to Europe—their first time—and made the Europeans sit up and take notice at the CDIs Aachen and Fritzens. To top it off, the pair came to Caen, qualified for the Grand Prix Freestyle, and then finished fifth—fifth!—on a score of 82.036 percent.

Do you have any idea how hard it is to break 80 percent in, well, any competition, but particularly international championship competition? And the WEG was Graves’s first score over 80.

“It’s a great feeling,” she said afterward. “If we hit 82 now, I’m excited to see where this could go. Just because your horse is talented doesn’t mean you’re going to get the big scores right away. It has to be really reliable; it has to be beautiful; it has to be strong; it has to be relaxed. All these things have to come together.”

“I wasn’t even expecting to come to Europe, let alone ride on this team,” Graves said.

Of her freestyle performance, Graves was particularly thrilled that Diddy “was really, really calm in [the stadium]. I could feel how cool he was. That was the most exciting of all. I worked him really lightly this morning; I didn’t want him to be tired, but I didn’t want him to be wild.” As it turned out, Diddy was a bit lazy in the trot half-passes early in the freestyle—but “he’s an easier horse to rev up than to cool down.”

Whenever a horse starts to get noticed, purchase offers usually follow. Graves concedes that she’s been approached, but “I refuse to hear numbers because he is never for sale,” she says.

Diddy is a gem, and “I want a horse for many years,” Graves said. So she’ll “take really good care of him” and then begin pointing him, carefully, toward the 2016 Olympics in Rio. But the US dressage team didn’t qualify for Rio here at the WEG—we would have had to medal in the team competition in order to do so—so there’s work to be done before then, she said.

Meanwhile, although “everyone’s looking forward to going home,” there’s little time to relax and celebrate. “The horses have to be out of here between six and seven tomorrow morning,” Graves said. The riders will return to their Belgian training base, and then Graves flies from Belgium to Miami on Monday. So let’s get the party started without further ado: “Hopefully there’s cold champagne at the barn!”

Laura Graves Isn't in Kansas Any More

Laura Graves and Verdades passage their way to a 77.157 and eighth place in the WEG Grand Prix Special. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

After her Grand Prix test yesterday, Team USA’s Laura Graves talked about adjusting to the realization that she and her horse, Verdades, had been named to the 2014 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games dressage team. It didn’t all sink in until yesterday, she said, and when she first heard the news there were no “fireworks and rainbows.”

Maybe someone overheard Graves’s comment, for “Over the Rainbow” was among the medley of songs playing during her spectacular Grand Prix Special test today (more on those songs in a minute).

“Diddy’s” tension all but disappeared today, and we saw the horse who wowed us at the WEG selection trials in June. Better than at Gladstone, actually: There was an added power and expression to Diddy’s piaffe and passage, and the test was spot-on accurate. Best of all, he achieved that elusive goal of making the extraordinarily difficult Grand Prix Special test look elegant and easy.

“He was just really nice to ride—which is why we do this, isn’t it?” Graves said afterward. “To go in and have a ride when you can’t be too critical of anything is a really nice ride to have.”

 

GP Special gold medalists Valegro and Charlotte Dujardin of Great Britain. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

Graves’s score of 77.157 percent vaulted her into the lead—for a while, anyway. But the British and German juggernaut came along, and reigning Olympic champions Charlotte Dujardin and Valegro took the definitive and unshakeable lead with a score of 86.120 percent, which would have been even higher had it not been for a momentary resistance in the walk-piaffe transition and a mistake in the two-tempis. (Australian judge Susan Hoevenaars, the head of the ground jury today, quipped afterward: “We wanted to give her 90 percent, but she wouldn’t let us.)

 

GPS silver medalists Damon Hill NRW and Helen Langehanenberg of Germany. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

On Dujardin’s heels through the entire competition and finishing second again today was Germany’s Helen Langehanenberg with the fourteen-year-old Westfalen stallion Damon Hill NRW (Donnerhall x Rubinstein I). Damon Hill is a fabulous athlete with an impressive piaffe-passage but lacks just a smidge of Valegro’s elasticity and range. An almost mistake-free test with a slight loss of balance in the piaffe after the walk put Langehanenberg in silver-medal position with a score of 84.468 percent.

A newcomer to the international-championships scene claimed the individual GPS bronze: Kristina Sprehe on the thirteen-year-old Hanoverian stallion Desperados FRH (De Niro x Wolkenstein II). From Sprehe’s wide eyes and at-a-loss-for-words responses in the post-medal ceremony press conference, it was evident that the 27-year-old Sprehe was amazed at her medal-winning score of 79.748 percent.

Graves and Verdades ended up eighth in the Special, beating tenth-place finishers Steffen Peters on Legolas 92—just as Peters had predicted could well happen one of these days. Legolas’s GPS test was a marked improvement over yesterday’s Grand Prix, with one mistake in the one-tempi changes on the center line and a final score of 75.742 percent.

 

Fans cheer on the American riders. Photo by Jennifer Bryant.

“It was tricky because in the warm-up, he didn’t want to stop after nine [tempi changes],” Peters said afterward. “I was super-excited that he actually quit on nine. And I had a better feeling than yesterday in the Grand Prix, and seeing those two American flags up there, making it into the final, that’s just awesome. We’re ‘keeping it in the family.’” But make no mistake: Peters isn’t ready to cede to Graves just yet. “Legolas has a hell of a freestyle,” he said.

Unfortunately, this was not Adrienne Lyle's day. A test marred by a series of mistakes gave the fifteen-year-old Oldenburg gelding (Weltmeyer x Classiker) a disappointing score of 69.202 percent for last place.

"My horse was not himself; something was bothering him," Lyle said afterward. 

Another disappointed competitor was German team gold medalist Isabell Werth, whose mount, Bella Rose 2, was withdrawn from the individual competition because of what the German federation called inflammation of the sole of the foot. When I find out more about that, I'll let you know.

Name Those Tunes

Oh, and about that music: Each rider gets a background-music medley of instrumental tunes, obviously chosen to reflect the nationality and the horse’s gaits, during the tests. The music is loud enough over the PA system that the effect is not unlike watching a freestyle, although Laura Graves said it’s not as loud in the arena itself. The effect can be pleasing or distracting, depending on whether the tempos match (they’re often not perfect) and whether the music selection seems appropriate for the pair. For instance, Carl Hester of Great Britain rode his Special aboard Nip Tuck to Rolling Stones tunes—OK, that makes sense. But the Netherlands’ Hans Peter Minderhoud on Glock’s Johnson TN rode to “Werewolf in London” followed by “It’s Raining Men.” To borrow from Forrest Gump, that’s all I’m going to say about that.

On Deck: Freestyle Friday

The second individual-medal dressage competition, the Grand Prix Freestyle, takes place Friday after the horses and riders enjoy a well-deserved rest day tomorrow. Audiences will be watching eagerly for Graves’s new freestyle: She says she’s amped up the difficulty and changed the choreography to improve the flow.

World Equestrian Games vs. Olympic Games

A common source of confusion among equestrian enthusiasts is: What's the difference, horse-sport-wise, between a World Equestrian Games and an Olympic Games?

A WEG is the quadrennial world championships for all eight of the International Equestrian Federation (FEI) disciplines: dressage, para-equestrian dressage, eventing, jumping, driving, vaulting, reining, and endurance. As such the WEG is produced by, and governed by, the FEI.

The 2014 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games in Caen, Normandy, France, begin tomorrow, August 23, with the opening ceremony and conclude September 7. Click here for a downloadable schedule of events -- which include not only the equestrian competition, but also a full lineup of concerts at the Alltech Music Festival and this year's exhibition sport, horse ball!

The Olympic Games -- the summer Olympics, to be precise -- also are a quadrennial international sporting championships, but they differ in some significant ways from a WEG.

For starters, the obvious: Olympics feature many sports besides equestrian. And only three equestrian disciplines are included: dressage, eventing, and jumping.

A very important but more subtle difference between a WEG and an Olympics is in the governance. Olympic Games are governed by the International Olympic Committee, under which fall all of the Olympic sports' international federations, including the FEI. The IOC's goals for the Olympics may differ somewhat from those of the FEI -- for one, the IOC places emphasis on global participation by as many nations as possible -- and therefore rules for the equestrian events at Olympic Games frequently are different from the strict FEI rules, right down to the dressage tests themselves. In London 2012, for example, competitors rode an "Olympic Grand Prix Special" that was shorter than the standard GP Special -- the better to fit in more competitors.

Aside from these differences, to the three Olympic equestrian disciplines, a WEG gold medal and an Olympic gold medal are equally prestigious. The Olympics get more mainstream press, but the competition is equally stiff. In fact, one could argue that in some cases a WEG medal is more prestigious -- such as in eventing, which is the sport most likely to have its track made a little less challenging at the Olympics, in order to accommodate the less-experienced nations.