Warmblood By Scot Tolman C
all me a dog with a bone, mulish, pig-headed, or any other mammalian-derived idiom to denote stubborn- ness, but I’m not ready to let go of this “born in the
USA to represent the USA” concept. I still think it has value. Here’s my favorite online response to this idea, the
subject of last issue’s column: “A silly idea that illustrates the chasm between top sport and some breeders.” Granted, my last column is one of my weaker pieces of writing of late; perhaps, it deserves to be dismissed with such a cavalier statement. Still, the concept of a national initiative to support breeders by requiring that horses representing a country are actually bred in the country has some worth, regardless of how badly it was proposed. (Later in this column, I’ll attempt to define this particular use of “chasm.”) Do I really think we should
make it a requirement for upper-level international competition that all horses representing the United States are bred in the United States? No. Top equestrian athletes and their sponsors should be able to scour the face of the earth for their most talented equine partners. And since two European countries, in particular, produce the largest number and/or most concentrated population of trainers capable of identifying and developing the talents of the young horses, then it makes sense that if we want to win medals, we buy in Holland or Germany. We do not have the system in place to take talented
young horses bred in the U.S. and develop them successfully through the levels to Grand Prix on a regular basis. There are exceptions. Look at Heather Blitz and Paragon, Liz Austin and Olivier, and Jim Koford and Rhett. These are all American dressage riders on American-bred horses. However, of the 43 horse and rider combinations that applied in March for an opportunity to be in contention for our Olympic dressage team (unless I either counted wrong or mistook the country of citizenship of the breeders of
these horses), only four horses first felt U.S. bedding under their fleshy little feet when they found their legs as foals. Perhaps the numbers are different for show jumpers and eventers—unfortunately, years of breeding specialization have left me knowing only the top names of riders and horses in other disciplines; my knowledge isn’t deep enough to glance at a list of these riders and their horses and know the breeding. At any rate, with more frequent exceptions in the sport of eventing, historically, our best international com- petitors in the three primary equestrian disciplines have been mounted on imported horses. Consequently, if you are a rider or a sponsor intent on making a U.S. team, and/or have the money to buy a horse with definite international potential, where do you shop? Not here. So, let’s go back to the
quotation in the second paragraph. This “chasm” the reader is speaking of is what? Different realities between some breeders and top sport competitors? Is that the chasm? Is this a metaphor? Or, is it the
Swedish Federation (progenitor of the original proposal concerning native-bred horses for the FEI Young Horse World Championship) that is destined to be stuck in this “chasm” and never achieve success at top sport? Or, maybe, it’s stupid breeders like me who think that our national organizations could do more to support our breeders? Granted, I’ve already confessed to a poorly written column/proposal, so, perhaps I’ve also fallen into a chasm of intellectual density and am just confused about the possibilities here. Let’s look at the scenario one more time and see if we
can’t make sense of it. Let’s assume the directors of the USEF vote to adopt a similar policy as Sweden, requiring the horses representing us at the Young Horse Championships in Verden be born and bred in the U.S. Consequence one: Riders/sponsors wishing to participate in this program have to find a horse in the U.S. Consequence two: If we wish to be competitive, we have to produce internationally talented
Photo: Freedom Hit owned by Markim Farms at three weeks old. He is by Freestyle out of Dubonnet (Diamond Hit/Roemer). Warmbloods Today 65
Photo courtesy MarKim Farms
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