It's official. NAWD has applied for recognized affiliate status with the USEF. Supporters have until June 11th to let the USEF know that North American Western Dressage is the right choice of organizations to build the future of Western Dressage. NAWD President Jen Johnson states: “Western Dressage is coming. Over the past 3 years we have watched it grow at warp speed from the hint of an idea to not just one but three major organizations with very different ideals. Throughout, NAWD...

Katie Dinan and Nougat du Vallet (The Book LLC) North Salem, NY – Three teenagers and a veteran rounded out the jump-off in the $100,000 Empire State Grand Prix presented by The Kincade Group, and the first to go in was the one to return to the winner's circle. Nineteen-year-old Katie Dinan of New York, NY, and her energetic partner Nougat du Vallet were double clear to win the biggest class of the Old Salem Farm Spring Horse Shows, which ran May 7-12 and 14-19. Sunday's...

Lexington, KY - Eleven of the United States’ best jumping riders head to Gothenburg, Sweden aiming to be named the 2013 Rolex/FEI World Cup Final champion. The United States is attempting to retain the title after a 25-year winless draught ended in spectacular fashion last year. The 2013 Rolex/FEI World Cup Final will run from April 24-28th in conjunction with the annual Gothenburg Horse Show in the Scandinavum Arena. Rich Fellers the 2012 Rolex/FEI World Cup Final Champion (SusanJStickle....

Lexington, KY – Three members of the United States’ 2010 Gold Medal World Championship team and four-time Grammy Award winner Lyle Lovett highlight the list of riders from the U.S., Canada and Italy entered to compete in the 2013 Kentucky Reining Cup which returns to the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington, KY, April 26-27. The event is held alongside the Rolex Kentucky Three-Day Event Presented by Land Rover, America’s only Four Star Eventing competition, April 25-28. Tom...

Tim Gredley and Unex Valente jump 7'6" (Sportfot) Wellington, FL - The $10,000 Puissance high jump competition was held on Friday evening at The Stadium at PBIEC prior to the FEI Grand Prix Freestyle presented by Horseware Ireland for the Adequan Global Dressage Festival. Great Britain's Tim Gredley and Unex Valente and Germany's Johannes Ehning and Salvador V went head to head over the wall in four rounds of competition with Gredley winning at a final height of 6'11" (2.10m). The...

I have been promising to update readers on current trends in the Western Dressage world. One way of keeping track of what WD is doing, where it is going and who is doing it is to track events. NAWD, CD and WDAA all maintain calendars of clinics and shows around the country. By analyzing those calendars we have a simple method of tracking what is happening. The information is limited by the fact that show and clinic organizers must report their event to the organization for inclusion on these...

Tiffany Sullivan scored her first big win after moving up to 1.50-1.60m competition this weekend at HITS Thermal. She and Tristan topped the $54,500 Purina Animal Nutrition CSI-W2* Grand Prix, presented by Zoetis (Flying Horse Photography) Thermal, CA - A grand prix victory is always impressive, but when it’s your first, and it’s in a 1.60m class, that bumps it into the realm of stunning, and stun the crowd is exactly what Tiffany Sullivan did Saturday night, riding Tristan to the...

A new National Collegiate Equestrian Association (NCEA) coaches poll was released Wednesday and as expected, there wasn’t any shakeup among the top hree teams. The most notable change was Kansas State’s flip with South Carolina to No.4 and No.5 respectively. Coming into the spring season the top four spots were occupied by SEC teams. Though the conference still has a stranglehold on the top two, good showings by Oklahoma State and Kansas State, in conjunction with South Carolina and...

Lisa Wilcox and Pikko del Cerro HU. (SusanJStickle.com) Wellington, FL - The 2013 Adequan Global Dressage Festival (AGDF) carried on Saturday with the third day of competition of the Wellington Dressage CDI-W presented by The Dutta Corp. The morning's classes featured the FEI Grand Prix Special and the FEI Intermediare 1. Judges for the FEI Grand Prix Special were Janet Foy (USA) at E, Lorraine MacDonald (CAN) at H, Sandy Phillips (GBR) at C, Wojek Markowski (POL) at M, and Jennie Loriston...

Today’s post comes from Sin City, Las Vegas Nevada. Since I am here in the region of Southwest Western Dressage, I decided to write the blog as an interview with someone from the Las Vegas equestrian community who was doing Western Dressage. So I opened up the phone book to call a local barn. Every barn number but one was disconnected or no longer in service. The one that was working was a casino! So I called a feed store, thinking that at the feed store would be someone who knew someone...