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Friday, August 22, 2008

Highs, Lows and Raised Eyebrows The 2008 Olympic Dressage Freestyles
By Karen Robinson for DressageDaily

Longtime contributor to HorsesDaily On the Scene coverage is Freestyle creator Canadian Karen Robinson, who we first had the pleasure of meeting at the 2002 WEG Games in Spain. Karen provided her expert coverage on the Dressage Freestyles at the 2006 WEG Aachen and is back with her candid obsrvations of an Olympic night which will not be forgotten. You can also check out Karen's blog on her website applausedressage.com.

If there was a defining characteristic to the individual final at these Olympics, it was that nothing happened as expected. There were tired horses, tense horses, confusion with the bell not ringing, and scores that left people wondering what some people have to do to lose a medal. Compared to Aachen World Equestrian Games two years ago in Aachen, we were missing the star appeal of a Matine, and yet there were some remarkable performances –  and signs of big things to come from some pairs that were new to most of us. On a personal note, I was a little let down by the evening – but that may well have been because both of my own clients had some problems, which I will talk about as I go through the evening’s performances below.

It might have been the footing, it might have been fatigue. Most of the riders were ahead of their music in the freestyles, some of them by quite a bit. Unfortunately for several, it led to mistakes, as they tried to make their horses wait for a transition to another gait, or to begin a line of tempi changes just….there. There were a lot of recurring themes when it came to choreography – everyone trying to get those extra marks for difficulty and calculated risk, some of them pushing the envelope past the comfort zone. Passage half pass was almost a must-do the way double pirouettes were a few years ago, and if your horse could turn in piaffe, then that went in too. The majority did a trot and passage tour before the walk, and canter afterward, with a few exceptions, including Steffen Peters. I saw more horses doing an extended trot to the final halt than I ever had at a major championship.

Where are the Goosebumps?