 |
| Endurance Rider! |
Ummm..WEG...that's World Equestrian Games, Mere (hee hee..just kidding).
Soooo much fun out at the Horse Park yesterday for the first real day of the World Equestrian Games. We totally lucked out with tickets for the final set of the Team Reining World Championships with awesome seats (well..they're all awesome really) and were there to see Shawn Flarida (USA) compete with the best ride of the whole event! And, we got to see the medal ceremony for the event which the US Team won by a pretty wide margin. It was just like the Olympics, except for the part where the riders rode out on their horses to mount the medal stand. Horses did not get on the stand though! The lovely Princess Haya of Dubai awarded the medals to the winners, the flags of the winning teams rose up as the Star Spangled Banner played. Very moving! I waved my American Flag the whole time and tried to get the people around me to shout USA like we were at the World Cup but I couldn't get anybody else to play along (as a tip, that's a great way to embarrass your teen-ager).
 |
| Add caption |
 |
| Shawn Flarida and horse doing the slide. He had the highest score of the day! |
 |
| That's Princess Haya. In the front...looking like a princess. |
 |
| The Medal Presentation. Horse to the left not so keen on the noise. |
 |
| The flags rising at the Reining Team Medal Presentation |
). Also, we saw several of the Endurance riders crossing Iron Works Road and Paris Pike and had to stop for them. Isabug (in from NY for the weekend) and I got out of the car and ran along the side of the road to get better pictures. It reminded me a bit of trying to take pictures of wildlfe in Yellowstone. Sheik Mohommed came in 2nd and the United Arab Emirates took the Team Gold. The first-place finisher was a woman from Spain who had given birth 7 weeks ago. Unbelievable! I think she might be my new hero.
Honestly, this couldn't be more exciting! We really do have the world here in Lexington!
