Re: Unofficial WEG team

[CMKSAGEHIL@aol.com]

In a message dated 98-10-15 00:14:54 EDT, barfield@primenet.com writes:

<< Having 2 or 3 qualifying rides in a European country is much less of a
logistics nightmare than it would be in the US.  How many good teams would be
left out of competition because they could not afford the time or money to
attend 2 or 3 competitions that required a 3,000 mile roundtrip.  I for one
would not like to go back to the days when our team was largely made up of
those that could find a way to afford it.  I'm not saying there are no
improvements that can be made, but a system that works in Europe might not be
the answer here. >>

Jerry, you make a good point, and in addition, in many cases in Europe there
is ONLY one 100-mile ride in a given country, and frequently only those who
finish it are even qualified to enter the FEI Championships.  The new FEI rule
that entrants and their horses MUST each have completed a 100-mile ride has
made it a scramble for many European countries to even field a squad of 6.
Prior to the ruling, those who had not could still compete with the permission
of their National Federation--one of my Danish finishers in Kansas had never
ridden farther than 75 miles prior to the WEC there, although his leased horse
had completed two 100-milers.  I can only speak for Denmark with any detail
(but I know many countries are in the same dilemma), but they hosted their
FIRST 100-miler earlier this summer, and if I remember right, they did manage
to qualify 6 horses and riders, but something has since happened to one of
them, so there may still be a possibility that one of the Danish riders from
North America may yet be going on a leased horse to represent Denmark.  (Prior
to this new 100-miler, the only way that Danes could do a 100 was to go to
another country.)  We take our wealth of 100-mile rides for granted, but many
other countries are not so lucky.  And Jerry is absolutely right--the
different circumstances and our huge expanse of geography makes the
qualifying-ride scenario pretty worthless here.

Heidi