Kyle Carter's Canadian Eventing Manifesto

Eventing in Canada is floundering. We don’t have enough participation at upper levels to adequately populate future teams, and the team riders we do have are demoralized with the current state of affairs. Unfortunately, we will continue on this downward spiral unless dramatic action is taken.

What is desperately needed to turn this ship around is a long-term plan for competition success. There is very little that can be done in a six-month time frame; rather, we need to create a plan that addresses each level of our sport over a period of years. We need to develop a plan for identifying young talent, educating them, and giving them the right opportunities to compete locally.

As an example of lost potential, for the 2015 Pan Ams in Toronto, Eventing Canada had 90 riders who declared an interest in being on the team. While not all of those candidates were at the right level, I don’t know of any follow-up effort done to keep in touch or to assess their future potential. I’m sure that many of those riders knew that the possibility of being on the team was remote, but they were interested in trying and the key to transforming our sport is in properly and systematically developing that spark.

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I’ve been considering this for years and I believe that three key areas need to be targeted immediately:

1. Educating Participants

Our industry tends to push the lesson mentality rather than truly educating our riders about proper horsemanship. To develop the best riders, we need to teach them the fundamentals, such as: How do you know if your vet is the right one? How do you know if your farrier is doing a good job? How do you evaluate a conditioning program?

I want you to know that I’m talking from experience here; I’m a product of the lesson mentality! When I was younger, I had great success in winning the ribbons, but not so much in the longevity department. I was wearing out or burning out my horses way too soon, because I was putting all my effort into fixing problems when the wheels came off, rather than preventing them in the first place. I’ve gotten to the point now where I can address issues before they become a problem, and we need to share that type of knowledge with everyone. These essential skills are what is going to give more riders the tools they need to improve and keep their horses healthy longer.

This type of program need not be costly or difficult to implement. It’s as simple as hosting a series of one-hour lectures at different events with the experts that are already available. Get team riders to share their experiences, have the course builder talk about building techniques, a vet discuss the best recovery strategies, a coach talk about how to develop a conditioning program, etc. We have all these experts at hand – it just takes a little bit of coordination to make it happen. Something similar is already being done by Jump Canada with their successful Under 25 program and Eventing should be doing it as well to create a stronger group participants.

The important aspect of these lectures is that they use available Canadian knowledge to improve our existing system. Canada has some incredible people: judges at WEG and Badminton, trainers at the very top levels, vets that work on team horses, and many more. Let’s utilize them and get the benefit of their experience to make the sport better.

2. Competitions at Appropriate Upper Levels

Canada has a dearth of Advanced-level competitions. Horse show organizers will tell you that there just aren’t the numbers to support the increased cost, but I have a different approach.

I propose setting up a specialized Canadian Horse Trials Series that would be customized to our purposes and that would be a softer Advanced-level event to start with, increasing difficulty over a period of time. The series would give riders the opportunity to get the experience they need over more technical courses right at home, but without organizers committing to the extra expense of a true Advanced event. Courses would be based on a six-minute track at about 570 meters per minute, which is the Advanced speed, but could be longer or shorter depending on where the event is held. There would be 24-29 numbered jumps over 3.5 km, which is doable with existing courses and infrastructure and can be adapted as necessary.

To begin with, we are going to use existing permanent features like banks, water, and ditches, but increase the technicality and difficulty about those elements by the type and placement of jump. At most events where we run Advanced and the lower levels run through the same permanent features such as water, we upgrade by increasing the difficulty of jumps around it.

The series would have a long-term plan so as not to stagnate. It might start with a reduced number of jumping efforts in the first year, but the standard would be raised in the following years as riders are able. The technicality is part of what is going to separate the series from the Intermediate level while still bettering the riders. The point is to start with a series that won’t over-face horses and riders, but that will slowly build their strength and confidence so that they aren’t even aware it’s happening.

At this point, I want to address the skeptical horse show organizers who are justifiably wary of hosting a class with poor attendance. I submit to you that there is a valuable upside to this! Most upper-level riders have several students that travel with them. So while there may not be a huge number of Intermediate or Advanced riders, they bring with them a decent number of students which would further bolster your lower-level divisions and offset the expense of hosting the bigger ones. There are about 25 Intermediate Canadian entries between Ocala and Aiken over the winter, and that’s because their trainers can do Intermediate and Advanced competitions at the same event. If you build it, they will come!

I live in Florida, Waylon Roberts lives in Pennsylvania, Rachel McDonough lives in Virginia, and the list goes on. We are living down here because that’s where the events are, but if we strengthen the events at home, trainers might return to Canada in the summer.

3. Canadian Ownership

Finding and keeping Canadian owners is a terrible problem. Riders feel obliged to take whatever they are offered, but then can’t afford to participate at the level they want and simply give up. A typical Canadian owner might buy a horse for a rider and feel as though they are being supportive, even if they don’t pay any of the costs.

I liken this scenario to finding an old car in the classifieds. The car might have potential, but it requires lots of labour, plus some new parts. You could do the work yourself, but you aren’t an expert and it could never amount to anything. A mechanic might be able to make something of it, but he’ll charge to fix it up. The car’s owner needs to decide how much investment the car is worth … same thing with training a horse.

Here’s the three-tier system I’ve developed that’s worked for me:

1. A full-fledged owner – This person buys the horse and pays for all associated expenses including shoeing, vet, entry fees, and the rider’s training time. This owner has full control and could exercise the option to move the horse to another rider at any time. They have paid for all the services and should rightfully have full control over what happens with the horse.

2. Split costs and proceeds – The owner has a mutual agreement with a rider who gets a stake in the proceeds. The owner buys and pays for all the hard costs and the rider adds value by providing lessons and training without directly charging for those services. If the owner decides to move the horse, however, they have to pay for the rider’s time and effort at a pre-determined rate. If the horse is sold, the rider gets anywhere between 30-50% of the value of the horse, depending on the rider. The rider is improving the value and deserves to be recognized financially, or be allowed to keep it.

3. Owner as part of the team – In this scenario, the owner provides the horse and agrees with the rider up-front what the future sale value of the horse might be, but other than that they have signed on for the ride whatever may come. They don’t have to pay any expenses and, if they are backing a potential top rider, they get to enjoy the limelight and perks associated with being a top owner at major events. If the horse is sold, then the owner gets the up-front value first agreed on, and the rider would get anything earned over and above that amount. Since the rider is putting in all the expense and effort that got the horse to that level, the rider has created the extra value and deserves the reward. If, however, a rider decides to retire a horse, then that is also fine and part of the bargain and the owner doesn’t get refunded – it’s simply the cost of being part of the team.

The point being, if an owner wants to get value out of a horse, then they need to pay accordingly – as they would pay a mechanic for fixing a car. By having guidelines like these, people will have some understanding of what to expect of a relationship between a rider and owner without having to re-invent the wheel each time.

I feel like we aren’t utilizing the resources we have available to us. With some of the countries I’ve worked with, they’ve lacked resources in every aspect, but we don’t. We should be utilizing the expertise we have to better help our present and future athletes. One of the problems we are facing has been that we haven’t focused on developing Canada’s eventing infrastructure and as a result we haven’t produced team-worthy riders in greater numbers. These are the building blocks for how a long-term plan would unfold to help remedy this problem.

Unlike the US, “Canada has a dearth of Advanced-level competitions. I propose setting up a specialized Canadian Horse Trials Series that would be customized to our purposes and that would be a softer Advanced-level
event to start with, increasing in difficulty

Leading up to the 2015 Pan Ams in Toronto, Eventing Canada had 90 riders express interest in being on the team. “I don’t know of any follow-up effort done to keep in touch or to assess their future potential … they were interested in trying and the key to transforming our sport is in properly and systematically developing that spark.”