Riding is an empirical art. When we witness that rare round or freestyle, we know that we’re watching something beautiful. But how do we know?
“One of the most dramatic demonstrations of concern and affection for GMHA took place following the flood of 1973,” wrote former Green Mountain Horse Association President Eileene Wilmot in Green Mountain Horse Association, 1926-1990s. “We all met to view the disaster and destruction, some of us with faint hearts. I never will forget Wilson Haubrich, who quietly said, ‘We have 120 children arriving in two days; we must get this fixed.’ Friends and members came down from the hills and up the valleys… In two days we were ready to receive the children.”
In London, 1961, authorities announced the discovery of a clandestine Soviet spy ring. In Liverpool, little-known skiffle group the Beatles first gigged in the Cavern Club’s cellar. And in Leeds, an outbreak of foot-and-mouth disease left sportsmen dismayed that the annual three-day event at Harewood House, home to the Earl of Harewood, would likely be canceled.
Stand beside the finish line of any racetrack in the world and dare yourself to remain unflapped. I’ve tried; it’s futile. The pack rounds the turn, and involuntarily your pulse quickens, eyes darting from hooves to outstretched necks to flying manes and tails as the hijinks of the bettors beside you intensify, the final moments igniting in a blaze of speed so fast it almost takes your breath away. You ask yourself: horsepower? Have I just felt the physical effects?
A couple of weeks ago, I gracefully parted ways with my mount while out foxhunting. I walked away hardly worse for the wear, less the pain of having to take flack from most of the men in the hunt. Whether my argument of not riding in my own tack, or having a headache, or ducking to avoid a branch were viable (but also pathetic) excuses, maybe the real problem was that I had sacrificed my seat, as was the male consensus—and as we all know, once that goes, so do you.
On March 5, Beezie Madden and Margie Engle joined fellow show jumping stars McLain Ward and Mario Deslauriers as the United States celebrated a win in the FTI Winter Equestrian Festival’s $75,000 Nations Cup. Engle was a member of the team that went to the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games, and Madden has ridden in two Olympics for the United States—scoring a team gold in Athens in 2004 and a team gold and individual bronze in 2008 in Hong Kong.
Having recently moved to Middleburg, Va., to work at the Chronicle, I was quickly mesmerized by the foxhunting culture. A neophyte to the tradition, I’ve spent hours talking to neighbors who lead the hunts and lend the land and whose walls, tables and mantels are complemented with fox and horn-themed décor.
“It is good to have an end to journey toward; but it is the journey that matters, in the end.” – Ursula K. LeGuin
When a light suddenly goes out, it takes a moment for your eyes to adjust to the darkness. When Alfred Patrick “Paddy” Smithwick passed away on Nov. 14, 1973, at the tender age of 46, the steeplechasing world lost one of its brightest stars.
Born in 1927, Smithwick began his career as an amateur in 1945 at the age of 19. He quickly climbed into the professional ranks in 1946, and by 1947 he finished 10th in the National Steeplechase and Hunt standings after winning seven races that year.
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