Photo by Randi Muster (Farewell and Rachel Koggan capture the Amateur-Owner Hunter 18-35 Championship at the 2010 FTI Winter Equestrian Festival. ) The 2010 FTI Winter Equestrian Festival had a very successful opening week of competition. New faces from across the country and around the world came to show at the Palm Beach International Equestrian Center, and close to 1,600 horses showed in the first week of the circuit. That is a 21% increase in horses that showed during the same week at last...

World class show jumpers vied for $75,000 in prize money, thousands of fans packed into the stands, flags from many countries hanging overhead, and a JumboTron showed highlights and tracked the results. Is it Las Vegas or Los Angeles? Neither; it is Sacramento, and it is the only show jumping competition of this caliber in Northern California: The Sacramento International Horse Show at Murieta Equestrian Complex in Rancho Murieta, CA, which was held November 3-8. Rudy Leone started the show in...

I'm here at the beautiful Kentucky Horse Park (KHP) in Lexington, Kentucky, for my third Arabian Sporthorse National (affectionately known as SHN)--although it is the seventh anniversary of the event splitting off from US Nationals to give sport horses a chance to shine all on their own. This year is the first that SHN has been held at the KHP, and boy are the gums flapping about the facility! Walking around the park, you'll pass one group oohing and aahing about how beautiful it is and...

Becky Holder and Courageous Comet (Ken Braddick) Hong Kong, China -- Before the 2008 Olympic Games officially begin, the US Eventing riders had another important task at hand: all five American horses sailed through the first horse inspection. The horses jogged by team, in alphabetical order by horse. Connaught (Phillip Dutton), Courageous Comet (Becky Holder), Mandiba (Karen O'Connor), McKinlaigh (Gina Miles) and Poggio (at Olympic Games number two) all looked very fit and sound when they...

Kentucky Equine Sports Medicine and Rehabilitation Center (KESMARC) and Main Street Management Services, Inc., (Main Street) proudly announces the formation of a joint venture to build a world-class equine sports medicine facility in Ocala, FL, as an integral part of the redevelopment of the 426-acre Farnsworth Farm into a unique equestrian community. Groundbreaking is scheduled for second quarter of 2007 with targeted completion by the beginning of 2008. Dedicated to the recovery and...

Randi Muster (McLain Ward and Sapphire) It came down to a four-rider jump-off speed round at the 2006 Rolex/USEF National Show Jumping Championship at the 123rd National Horse Show in Wellington, FL, on Sunday afternoon. And in a finish befitting the championships sponsor—Rolex—the crowds counted split seconds in the final speed test. When the last rider left the course and the points were tallied, McLain Ward and his Sapphire bested all challengers to win the title in a suspenseful, yet...

Team USA does it again by bringing home the Team Gold medal in reining. Pictured are: Dell Hendricks, Tim McQuay, Aaron Rahlston and Matt Mills. (By Ceci Flanagan-Snow) More than 38,000 fans of reining and driving descended on the 2006 World Equestrian Games on Friday to watch the exciting marathon phase of four-in-hand driving and the Team medal competition in the Western discipline of reining. It was a Gold-medal day for Team USA’s reiners, while three American drivers took to the...

By Bob Langrish (Beezie Madden and Authentic in the Main Stadium in Aachen, Germany.) (Aachen, Germany)— The 16 efforts put in front of the 116 show jumpers going round during the 1st qualifier and speed class for the individual and team FEI World Championships in Aachen were a bit more than a few could handle. And for Team USA, there were few bumps along the road translating into less than a handful of downed rails in a windy Main Stadium. Over the day, six horses were eliminated, and...

Bob Langrish (Steffen Peters aboard Floriano finished in fourth place in the grand prix special during Friday's dressage competition in Aachen.) (Aachen, Germany)—To say it was tough competition today in the dressage grand prix special at the 2006 World Equestrian Games (WEG) would be a gross understatement. But two Americans made it look like a walk in the park. American’s Guenter Seidel and Steffen Peters, who are now both poised to enter a showdown among the top 15 dressage...

For the eighth time in her career, and for the third year in a row on Hidden Creek’s Wapino, Margie Engle raced to victory in the $65,000 Merrill Lynch Cleveland Grand Prix, the nation’s oldest show jumping classic. The class is still held at the beautiful Metropark Polo Field in Moreland Hills, OH, the site of the original Cleveland Grand Prix, first held in 1965. An enthusiastic crowd of over 5,000 braved a blistering hot 90-plus degree Sunday afternoon in the steamy Chagrin Valley. Twenty...