You may have been wondering where I’ve got to these past weeks. The posts have been few, and the humour laboured, if there at all. I’m afraid I’ve had all too good an excuse: my mother Elizabeth (known to most in the horse community as Liz) passed away on November 3rd. I have always done […]

My Google alerts have been liberally peppered lately with news items about someone not generally known for having scurf under his finger nails: Bill Gates. First it was about the $40,000 (and counting) in fines he’s racked up with an illegal manure bin at his spread in Welly World (the one he bought when he […]

One of the reasons I have so enjoyed the equestrian writing these past dozen years has been the opportunity to travel. I am a self-confessed travel addict, the bug having bitten hard when I was a teen – probably even earlier. Covering a WEG, an Olympics, a Pan Am Games, has been an excuse to […]

…to share the exciting news that Canada has finished SECOND in the Furusiyya FEI Nations’ Cup final in Barcelona! Go Canada! Go Tiffany! Go Ben! Go Yann! And go Captain Lamazing! Zigali had me feeling the fear during his round because he had two rails in Thursday’s qualifying round, and his WEG performances were hardly […]

We’ve had a WOW so now it’s time for a BOW. While it was hard to pick a WOW out of the dense pile last week, my number one BOW is easy to identify: the horses of course! In some ways it’s a shame for some of the horses at WEG because so many of […]

That’s the acronym for my post-Normandy blog series, Best Of WEG, Worst Of WEG. One of the kinder things I’ve been called in this business of horse writing is a barking dog, so the name seems appropriate. And in keeping with the theory that bad experiences are more fun to read about than good ones, […]

Just a quick note to let you know I’m not done with WEG, but it will be a couple of days before I put my wrap up together and post it here. I’m working on a ‘highs and lows’ of Normandy 2014 – you can imagine which category is already bursting at the seams. Back […]

(sorry for the absence of pictorial accompaniment today, but the internet here is too slow to upload any photos) As the last of the Canadian team members – the jumpers and the vaulters – are winging their way homeward, it seems like an appropriate moment to reflect on Canada’s results here in Normandy.  There was […]

I arrived today looking forward to watching our very last Canadian WEG team member at these 2014 World Equestrian Games compete in the individual jumping final. I was blissfully but briefly unaware that Yann had pulled out of today.  He wasn’t alone. Also withdrawing today were a few of the rock stars that show jumping […]

Sorry folks, but if you are one of the people who posted comments yesterday who think I should put on rose tinted glasses, you aren’t going to get any joy from me today.  I am not here to tell you something is good when it isn’t – whether it’s Canada’s results, a traffic jam, or […]