What is Eventing?

Eventing is the ultimate test of horse and rider - comprising three disciplines - Dressage, Cross-Country and Show Jumping, the scores from each test combine to produce an overall total.

The ultimate form of Eventing competition is the THREE DAY EVENT when each test takes place on a different day starting on day one with Dressage, day two consists of two sections of Roads & Tracks separated by Steeplechase and finally, the challenge of the Cross Country course. On the final day, there is Show Jumping completing the triathlon of disciplines. The sport also comprises ONE DAY EVENTS with all three tests on one day or TWO DAY EVENTS where competitors Dressage and Show Jump on day one and the second day is the Endurance day with cross country.

Eventing (or sometimes referred to as Horse Trials) originally evolved from the training of cavalry horses. The sport is rather like the pentathlon in that it combines different disciplines in one competition and is run on a cumulative penalty basis.

All horses need to build up their levels of skill, the sport has different levels of competition: Novice, Intermediate and Advanced through which horses progress as they score points and gain experience. This leads to an interesting feature of the sport which is that all riders compete in Novice classes with the top riders on their young horses competing often against relatively inexperienced rider who can and do beat them on occasions. Also men and women compete on equal terms - there are no distinctions or single sex classes.

The first test is dressage, which comprises a set sequence of compulsory movements in an arena 20 metres wide and 40 metres long (60 metres at higher levels of competition). The test is judged by one or more judges who are looking for balance, rhythm and suppleness and most importantly, obedience of the horse and its harmony with the rider.

The show-jumping phase is one round of jumping with a maximum time allowed and the objective is to jump all the fences clear inside the time. The fences are not as high as top level show-jumping but are quite substantial for horses which are not specialists at show-jumping. Fences knocked down and refusals incur penalties as does exceeding the time allowed.

The third phase is the cross-country where a course of natural obstacles has to be jumped - again inside an optimum time - being over the time incurs penalties and being well under it is of no benefit and unnecessarily tires the horse. Stopping at obstacles or falling off also incurs penalties.
It is an Olympic discipline and is amongst a handful of sports where men and women compete on equal terms and the genuine amateur can be pitted against a World or Olympic champion.