December 1, 2006

December is our downtime here in the US eventing scene, so it’s a perfect time to get started on a new column.

My name is Jeanie Hannen, and I’m a new-ish eventing professional, having had a real job in sports marketing before figuring out how to ride full time. My husband Tim is a math teacher at a boarding school, and since his job comes with free housing and food, I could start my own teaching and training business without fear of immediate homelessness! The interesting twist to the set-up is that we are dorm parents for 20 fifteen year old boys, which is never dull and is often still loud and rambunctious at 3 AM. They’re good kids though - Tim once packed them into the school bus in their coats and ties to watch me ride in a dressage clinic. They stood quietly against the arena wall, fitting right in with the oh-so- formal environment!

I spend most of my daylight hours teaching an enthusiastic and competitive group of adult and teenaged eventers. I am co-DC of our local Pony Club, and I try to further my own riding as much as time and money permit. I also enjoy snowboarding, fly fishing, ice hockey, and motorcross, but I don’t have much free time anymore! Tim races go-karts on weekend and vacations, so I try to watch him whiz around whenever possible. His motto is “win or crash”, which he helpfully suggests every time he comes to see cross country.

I have two horses that my students helped me buy. Ping Pong is a very naughty ISH gelding who did his first one star last year, and Bimini Twist (“Bill”) is an irish TB that we bought off the jump race track this fall.

Ping Pong did his one star in fall 2005, and has sadly been struggling to overcome a series of minor injuries ever since. I am trying to get him organized to head to Florida for our winter season in 2007. He lives up to his name, being a bit spooky and naughty, but he is always cheerful and could be my first advanced horse. He was great at his 3-day, collecting 20 penalties when I got over excited and missed a turn, but still finishing within the time.

Bill is very different than his stablemate. He is a dignified, formal horse with a settled, confident mind and a great work ethic. He did his first Novice (3’) event only three weeks off the track, jumping clean in both phases! Bill thought his dressage was excellent too, but the judge disagreed, noting that 20 meter circles require rudimentary steering ability. It is not normally within my training philosophy to go straight from the track to the events, but we had an available entry at the last minute, and Bill was coming for a ride-around anyway, so we gave it a try. I had decided to pull up as soon as he felt challenged, but it never happened! He blazed through the water, over the half coffin, and through the woods, then applied himself to a careful clear round in show jumping. Pretty exciting. He has since had 6 weeks out in the field and is now starting normal flat work.

Our eventing season in the USA is fragmented. I live and compete on the border between Areas 1 and two – New England and the Eastern states. Our northern season runs from late spring to mid fall, although we typically have lots of early season events cancelled due to rain. We then have rock hard and uneven footing at many summer events. As a result, many of us travel to Area III (southeast) in the winter.

I go to Ocala, Florida where I rent stalls from my coach, Buck Davidson. Buck hates cold weather and is usually the first rider to move south in November. I will join him in late January and plan to stay through March. I am the last to head south and the first to return north, but my three-day plans are unknown at this point and I like my home life too!

This year I have 6 horses making the trip to Florida. It is a 24 hour drive – miserable, and made difficult by the fact that it is usually snowing when we leave and 80 degrees when we arrive. It is hard to know how to dress the horses in the trailer, and it is quite a shock for them. I am lucky to have the use of a nice, smooth British-style lorry for 5 of the horses, and the others will ride in my 4 horse gooseneck trailer behind my husband’s pick up truck. I’ll live in the lorry for the winter, and Tim will fly home and leave me the truck to drive around town. I have a working student, Jessica, coming to do her first ever eventing. My other students will fly in and out and compete on the weekends. I can’t wait!

Some reference vocabulary and some questions:

I have really enjoyed browsing through EventingWorldwide.com, but I have lots of questions and observations about the differences between the sport in the UK and in the USA. First off, vocabulary:

Lorry = Horse Van. But we seldom use vans. Most Americans have trucks and trailers, some of which have become very elaborate in the recent past. They have living quarters (what the heck is a “hobb”?), TVs, and toilets. They are pulled by enormous diesel pick-up trucks or a new version of the tractor trailer cab called a “sport tractor”.

All Weather Gallops = race tracks? I know you all gallop in all weather, so I assume this term refers to a place to gallop that has prepared footing. How great! I know that Karen and David O’Connor have a galloping track up a large hill on their farm, but I don’t know of others. The real race tracks here are made with very deep sand, and they never allow outsiders anyway. This is a litigious society. Most eventers here in the New England gallop gingerly around the hay fields, hoping against hope that all will go well. I trot lots and gallop very little. In the winters in Florida, however, the soil there is sandy and perfect to gallop on. It makes sense to use Florida to prep for spring CCIs and then give the horses the summer off.

Parallel = Oxer

Double = In and Out

Upright = Standard

Pole = Rail

What is Haylage? Dengi?

Livery = Board

Our levels of competition are also somewhat different, and I get the impression that more of our competitors compete at lower levels.

We have the following US Eventing Association recognized levels:

Beginner Novice (2’6”) No combinations, water must be beach entry and exit.

Novice (2’11”) Easy combinations, ditches, tiny trakehners allowed. Banks out of water are allowed, but no drops in.

Training (3’3”) Slightly more technical XC, triple combination allowed in stadium.

Preliminary (3’6”) Corners, bounces, angled combinations, etc. allowed.

Intermediate

Advanced

Most American eventers compete at BN and Novice levels only. A tiny number get to Preliminary and above. It is a very amateur-driven sport here. This is good from a business perspective, but it changes the type of horse we look for and train, inflating the prices of less-able but more rideable animals. I like draft cross types, or connemara cross types, as they tend to gallop with their knees and necks up, which makes it safe and fun for people to learn to jump cross country.

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