The First Day..........

While I have done other things today my focus has really been on the opening of the World Equestrian Games. I didn't get to watch the first session of reining this morning because I kept getting error messages that make me suspect their servers were overwhelmed by the initial response. I did, however, get to see the afternoon session. Yeah for me!!!!! Still I know that Sweden opened the games with the first ride in the reining competition. I learned that little tidbit in the opening ceremonies. I wish I'd taken some notes as the teams paraded into the arena because I probably missed some other good morsels of blog fodder. I do know that Poland sent a reining team............and only a reining team. .......whodda thunk.......... Have the cowboys taken over Europe?

The announcer, whose name has illuded me, has tickled my blogging fancy a bit. It was a bit confusing and a lot amusing listening to the European announcer talk reining during that event. My enjoyment carried over into the opening ceremonies.

Obviously European and well versed in the normal fare for these kinds of events his interpretations of things American, cowboy and reining have made me giggle at times. His commentary on reining in progress caught me a little off guard at first. I was not expecting to hear "canter" but I only did a small double take, and to his credit he only did it once or twice. Run downs as a description for small circles still has me shaking my head and since he does call the run down before the sliding stops just that, I am wondering if he's even realized he's using the same term for two different things.

It's OK! It just tickles me to hear the polished European voice complete with accent talking western dressage as he labelled it. Careful trying to back peddle a bit and still not dish the sport he went into a lengthy explantion of the comparisions to the sport he knows best. I couldn't help but giggle at all the dressage queens I've met over the years who would have been gritting their teeth and maybe even pulling their hair at their beloved, exclusive sport being help up against the good ole cowpokes if they'd heard it.

Maybe the world is making some changes after all. There was definitely respect in this man's voice as he described the skills of these horses and what kinds of things were bringing the highest scores.

In the opening ceremonies it was great to see Arabian horses given the credit they are due. Introduced as the oldest breed of horse and the horse upon which all other modern horse breeds are built. The Gift of the Desert - The Arabian Horse opened with a beautiful chesnut western pleasure horse ridden by Audrey Hart, I believe, and followed in by Arabian horses representing nearly every division of perfomance that Arabian horses do. There were few announcements of who the horses or riders were except for the mention of WN Knight Rider several times and his breeder, Wayne Newton. A presentation of the Gift of the Desert will be presented each day throughout the ALLTECH FEI World Equestrian Games.

Unfortunately I lost the feed a couple of times but I did get to see the dressage demonstation by ten beautiful Freisian horses. It was beautifully correographed and great fun to watch. Seeing things like that makes me think I might actually try dressage some day.

I missed the names of the cowboys doing the demonstation with the loose horses but that was pretty darn cool along with the Cowboy Dressage, which is definitely my style. If I could ever get lead changes down, I could do that stuff with Legs. The only thing he doesn't do that cowboy did is the changes like that and the deficiency is definitely mine and not Legs.

Stacy Westfall was amazing as always. More time was spent on the singer than Stacy but still any chance to see Stacy ride is a a real treat. I'd love to see her in person some day.

Oh, I must not forget the biggest laugh I got today from the announcer. It was during the parade of exhibitors when the huge US contingent entered with many wearing their...........Five gallon hats?? I need to get me one of those...............