2014 Normandy: The Organising Committee promotes the Games in Barcelona

Alltechfeiweg2014-normandy.com - Full Article

October 1 2013

France was guest of honour at CSIO Barcelona from 26-29 September for two reasons. First came victory for the "blue jackets" in the final of the Nations Cup, then the Normandy 2014 Organising Committee promoted the Games by holding a press conference for the international media and a field-based promotional operation to reach Catalonia’s horse-riding enthusiasts!

The French team wins the Nations Cup final

The French national team - comprised of Simon Delestre, Patrice Delaveau, Eugénie Angot, Aymeric De Ponnat and Pénélope Leprévost, and led by Philippe Guerdat – dazzled by winning the new-look Nations Cup series, beating Brazil by just one point! The level of competition was very high, since among the other 7 nations present were Great Britain, reigning Olympic and European Champions; the Netherlands, who have already won two Cups this season; Canada, including multi medal-winner Eric Lamaze; and Brazil, winners of the qualifying competition. Two days earlier, Normandy native Patrice Delaveau triumphed in the Longines Cup, the most important individual class at CSIO Barcelona, on Carinjo Hdc. All in all, it was a great performance by the French team just under a year before the Games begin!

The 2014 Games presented to the international media

Just a few hours before the final of the Nations Cup, Fabien Grobon, Chairman of the Organising Committee, Laurent Cellier, Director of Sports, and Celine Gualde, our press relations consultant, took advantage of the international media presence at Barcelona Polo Club to hold a press conference for around fifty journalists. It was a great opportunity to present the 2014 Games again...

Read more here:
http://www.alltechfeiweg2014-normandy.com/en/news/the-organising-committee-promotes-the-games-in-barcelona--a239.html

Toads, snake poison and dead horses

NZZ.ch - Full Article

Doping in endurance riding
October 12 2013

[google translation from German]

The Endurance is horrible because of doping-like practices continue in the headlines. For Princess Haya, President of the International Equestrian Federation, a huge burden. Because her husband is brought into connection.

by Peter Jegen

Etti Plesch, born Countess Maria Wurmbrand-Stuppach 1914 in Vienna, had a penchant for fast horses and rich men. "Horses and Husbands" is the name for the biography published after her death in 2003, starting with the fact that the total of six times married woman twice the Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe won with the gallopers and Psidium Henbit, at a young age with An American millionaire's son was verkuppelt. Because the poor family only possessed the title of nobility.

«Horses or spouse" according to the biography would be called, which could draw the Jordanian Princess Haya bint al-Hussein one day once. For the life of the President of the Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI) her husband is becoming increasingly difficult to stressful mortgage.

Sheikh Mohammed and the doping
The 39-year-old Princess Haya is a second wife of Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid al-Maktoum, the 64-year-old ruler of Dubai. This maintains one of the largest horse with Godolphin racing stables in the world, was hit in the spring of a big doping scandal. Full coverage anabolic steroids were administered as a control training in Newmarket (England) showed.

Guilty as the trainer Mahmood al-Zarooni was branded, meanwhile, Sheikh Mohammed immediately cooperated with the authorities to close the affected stall left in his emirate of Dubai exacerbated the doping regulations.

The damage was done, however, and the efforts to achieve a drug-free sport horses seemed hardly credible, because Sheikh Mohammed did not come out of the headlines. He himself was as endurance riders already closed due to doping, and in one of his English stables where horses are trained for endurance riding, in a raid in September 124 medical products were confiscated, which are not authorized in the UK for horses.

An explosive Fund because the Endurance as opposed to horse racing, a discipline of the FEI, with the Princess Haya to act as the President for an ethical handling of horses and against doping. Of which her husband apparently seems not too much to keep.

As in the Chamber of Horrors
Efforts to ease term limits on the FEI peak at the beginning of November in Montreux upcoming General Assembly from 8 to 12 Years, Princess Haya recently declined with thanks. You will not be the end of their term of office end of 2014 continue to be available, they left with reference to their statements made to the office know.

However, as they are likely to have influenced the recent events, especially the Swiss Equestrian Federation for months by the FEI and a workup of doping in endurance riding, the so-called Endurance calls. A FEI Commission has now established, but lack the independence, from the Swiss. Also complained that primarily improve the situation in the future, but not proven doping should be worked up.

The latter is urgently needed because it seems like going to and fro in the chamber of horrors. The Swiss Association President Charles Trolliet, himself vet says that the FEI has tested positive between January 2010 and December 2012 at 41 international events horses in Endurance, primarily on steroids, anti-inflammatories and painkillers. The figures come from a statistic that has for the same period, 29 tested positive for jumping horses and states that 82.9 percent of cases in the Endurance rider from the Arab concern.

Cocktails with toads and snake poison
"Le Monde" wrote a few days ago even of dead horses. The French association had three deaths at endurance events in 2012 registered. And over the sheet tells of a veterinarian that horses will injected intravenously vodka, enriched with the painkiller Sarapin, an extract of the pitcher plant, and toads or snake venom.

What sounds like a horror story, might not be so far-fetched. Reported in the previous year, "New York Times" about similar practices in American horse racing. There were about 30 horses tested positive for dermorphin, which originates from South American frogs. The agent should numb pain, but also make the same hyperactive and thus be more effective than just pain-suppressing cobra venom.

As FEI President still viable?
If the situation continues to worsen and the horses empire of Sheikh Mohammed does not come out of the doping headlines, inevitably raises the question of whether his wife is even more portable than FEI President. Princess Haya is to finish the second term? A withdrawal before the end of next year would in the face of widespread outrage against the conditions in the Endurance hardly surprising.

A premature withdrawal would certainly be a distressing line under a presidency that began so promisingly. Princess Haya, FEI transformed the antiquated in a modern global sports federation and brought a lot of character (Arabic) money. Achievements, currently stand in the shadows, throwing her husband about the equestrian sport.

Revealed: the equine drugs seized by police on Sheikh Mohammed's Dubai government jet

Telegraph.co.uk - Full Article

An illegal shipment of equine drugs seized at Stansted Airport from a private jet owned by the Dubai government consisted of more than 200 doses of 15 different medicines.

By Pippa Cuckson
30 Sep 2013

Among them were injectables which should only be given by a vet and 100 doses of Tildren, a drug which encourages regeneration of bone tissue, and which if prescribed would only be given to a horse once or twice a year.

The extraordinary haul of medicines, which are not licensed for use in the UK, was seized and destroyed by the UK Border Agency and the Veterinary Medicines Directorate in May. Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, the ruler of Dubai and the most powerful figure in British racing, has opened an internal investi­gation into how the plane was discovered to be carrying an array of powerful medicines of a kind which are prohibited under anti-doping rules in the sport of endurance racing.

The Stansted raid, revealed by The Daily Telegraph in September, was followed in August by a seizure by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs of other unlicensed equine drugs at Moorley Farm. The farm, near Newmarket, is owned by Sheikh Mohammed’s ­Darley breeding operation and used as a summer base for his endurance racing horses, who spend the rest of the year in Dubai...

Read more here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/horseracing/10345923/Revealed-the-equine-drugs-seized-by-police-on-Sheikh-Mohammeds-Dubai-government-jet.html

Kentucky Horse Park in running for 2018 world games

Courier-journal.com - Full Article

October 3 2013
Written by Gregory A. Hall
The Courier-Journal

The World Equestrian Games could be coming back to the Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington in 2018, the international committee that conducts the event announced Thursday.

If chosen, the park would be the first two-time host for the quadrennial event that began in 1990 and includes eight equestrian world championships.

The Federation Equestrian International announced Thursday that it has received interest from Great Britain, the USA and Canada to host the 2018 world championships. The two U.S. cities under consideration are Lexington, which hosted the 2010 games at the horse park, and Wellington, Fla., another equestrian competition center near Palm Beach.

“The FEI World Equestrian Games is our flagship event, appealing to huge global audiences of equestrian enthusiasts and sports fans, and these expressions of interest by Great Britain and the USA alongside Canada are testament to the power of these Games,” FEI Secretary General Ingmar de Vos said in the statement...

Read more here:
http://www.courier-journal.com/article/20131003/NEWS01/310030038/Kentucky-Horse-Park-running-2018-world-games?gcheck=1&nclick_check=1

South Africa: Dansawil Arabian Stud Endurance Team Impresses South Africa

Thevoicebw.com - Full Article

Dansawil Arabian Stud Endurance team, sponsored by Nutri Feeds Botswana, competed over the weekend of the 4th and 5th of October at the Stella Endurance Ride in North West province in South Africa.

Endurance riding is the fastest growing equine sport in the world and Dansawil Arabians established in 1979 is one of the most experienced endurance Arabian Studs in Southern Africa.

The Stella ride consisted of a 40km novice horse track on Friday and a competitive 80km track on Saturday.

The Springbok Team riding time on this track is 04.02 hours. The track is one of the fastest in South Africa.

The Dansawil Team consisted of two Batswana riders, Willie Herbst and Tebogo Mosorwa.

The team was completed by Felicity Cooper and Louise Herbst as team manager and groom respectively.

Willie Herbst owner of Dansawil Arabian Stud and rider is one of the most experienced endurance riders in Southern Africa having successfully ridden over 16 000km...

Read more here:
http://www.thevoicebw.com/2013/10/11/dansawil-arabian-stud-endurance-team-impresses-south-africa/

Mont Saint Michel & Haras du Pin gear up for Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games

Examiner.com - Full Article

October 11, 2013

The Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games 2014 in Normandy takes place August 23-September 7 in France. A group of journalists headed there October 9-12 to check things out. For three days they immersed themselves in the culture, savored the food and viewed the venues where the eight disciplines will be showcased.

Those eight disciplines include Dressage, Show Jumping, Reining, Vaulting, Para Equestrian, Driving, Endurance and Eventing. For the most part the first five will be taking place in the region of Caen. The close proximity of the venues one from the other makes it easier to get from venue to venue via the media shuttles.

If your accommodations are within the city of Caen, the time spent in shuttles will be less. However, for the Eventing and Endurance there will be a bit of a drive to get to the venues where those two events will be held.

Endurance will take place in the vicinity of Mont Saint Michel, a spectacular island commune whose central focus is its church which dates back to the eighth century. The church is surrounded by water which disappears when the tide is low but appears like a moat around this antique building during high tide...

Read more here:
http://www.examiner.com/article/mont-saint-michel-haras-du-pin-gear-up-for-alltech-fei-world-equestrian-games

Nightline 10/08: Mongol Derby: World's Longest, Toughest Horse Race

ABCNews.co.com

ABC's Nightline 10/08/2013, episode 210, features the Mongol Derby, the world's longest, toughest horse race.

FEI clamps down on unauthorised medicating of horses during competition

Telegraph.co.uk - Full Article

The International Equestrian Federation (FEI) is clamping down on unauthorised medicating of horses during competition as the crisis over doping and horse injuries in endurance racing deepens.

By Pippa Cuckson
04 Oct 2013

Just three days after revealing the FEI is rolling out a new injuries surveillance system (ISS), Telegraph Sport has learnt the FEI is banning ammonium chloride – a substance primarily associated with controversial analgesic technique of “nerve-blocking” – and proposing to limit crew numbers so that horses cannot be concealed from officiating vets.

The Swiss, Belgian and French equestrian federations were lobbying the FEI about “inequities” in Middle Eastern endurance before the drugs raids in May and August on properties owned by Sheikh Mohammed, the reigning endurance world champion and the most powerful owner in thoroughbred horseracing.

The source of the illegal drugs is now being investigated on Sheikh Mohammed’s behalf by his wife, Princess Haya of Jordan, president of the FEI, and Lord Stevens’ intelligence company Quest.

Endurance, which involves races up to 160km, is the only equestrian sport applying vet checks on the field of play during the event. Critics have cited the large size of “crews” – grooms and physios – employed by teams, sometimes as many as 12 per horse, for effectively obscuring it from view.

FEI judge Juliette Mallison told the leading German equestrianism magazine Reiten St Georg that when she was officiating in Dubai in February, two members of her veterinary team saw “a horse surrounded by numerous grooms, the neck covered with a towel, and a further groom inserted the catheter into the [jugular] vein for the infusion disguised in his jacket sleeve.” The horse was disqualified, the officials receiving “ the trainer’s angry abuse”...

Read more here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/10357456/FEI-clamps-down-on-unauthorised-medicating-of-horses-during-competition.html

Scandal-hit racehorse owner Sheikh Mohammed orders 'junior wife' to head probe into banned equine drugs found on board Dubai government private jet

Dailymail.co.uk - Full Article

• Banned equine drugs discovered at Stansted on flight from Dubai
• Sheikh Mohammed has now ordered an investigation into the seizure
• His wife Princess Haya is to carry out the investigation
• British Horseracing Authority confident drugs were not for racehorses

By JAMES RUSH
PUBLISHED: 05:25 EST, 30 September 2013

The owner of the scandal-hit Godolphin stable has ordered a new investigation after banned equine drugs were discovered on a Dubai government private jet when it was searched at Stansted airport.

Officers from the UK Border Agency, along with the Veterinary Medicines Directorate, seized the unlicensed products from a Dubai Royal Air Wing flight earlier this year, it has been reported.

Sheikh Mohammed bin Rashid Al Maktoum, monarch of the gulf emirate, has now ordered his junior wife Her Highness Princess Haya, president of the International Federation for Equestrian Sports, to carry out an investigation into the incident.

Read more here:
http://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-2438560/Scandal-hit-racehorse-owner-Sheikh-Mohammed-orders-probe-banned-equine-drugs-board-Dubai-government-private-jet.html

FEI Endurance Strategic Planning Group meets in Lausanne

Oct 2013

The FEI Endurance Strategic Planning Group (ESPG) held its second meeting this week as part of the ongoing process of strategic planning to meet the needs of the FEI’s second biggest discipline.

The Group, which is chaired by Andrew Finding (GBR), spent a full day working on the development of a proposed strategic plan for Endurance that will address all of the challenges faced by the sport, and continued its work on the four key areas already identified that the Group believes require specific review to ensure that the discipline continues to grow in the correct direction - Governance and Structure; Culture and Responsibility; Communication; and Foundation for Growth.
During the meeting, which was held at FEI Headquarters in Lausanne (SUI), ESPG members were also briefed by FEI Directors from the Veterinary and Endurance Departments on progress already made following the round table session in July, including the imminent implementation of the Injury Surveillance System, the ongoing management and assessment of FEI Endurance Officials, and Rule changes for approval at the GA.

“The issues are complex and wide ranging but the core challenge is to put in place a plan that will promote substantially reduced malpractice while ensuring the levels of supervision, management and regulation are right for a global sport. At its heart will be a call for cultural change, for good governance and self discipline”, ESPG Chair Andrew Finding said. 
“We are working to present a clear strategy for consideration by all National Federations as well as the FEI Bureau. We are acutely aware of the importance of this work, but no committee can resolve all the challenges. Ultimately, it will be the quality of leadership in all National Federations that will resolve the issues we face.”  

The Group will hold a further in-person meeting prior to the dedicated Endurance session at the FEI General Assembly in November. The ESPG will then produce a detailed strategic plan for consultation early next year.

Notes to Editors:
The FEI Endurance Strategic Planning Group (ESPG) is chaired by Andrew Finding, European Equestrian Federation Board Member and CEO of the British Equestrian Federation.

The members of the Group are veterinarian Brian Sheahan (AUS), chair of the FEI Endurance Committee; Joe Mattingley (USA), international Endurance rider; Saeed H Al Tayer (UAE), Vice President of the Dubai Equestrian Club and organiser of FEI World Endurance Championships; and veterinarian Jean-Louis Leclerc (FRA), an internationally respected and very successful chef d’équipe and team manager within the discipline.

Uruguay dominates Pan-American endurance champs

Horsetalk.co.uz - Full Article

By Horsetalk.co.nz on Oct 03, 2013 in Just Briefly

Uruguay made a clean sweep of the FEI Pan-American Endurance Championships for Seniors, Young Riders & Juniors for the second year running last weekend

They took Team and Individual gold on home turf at the hippodrome in Trinidad, the capital city of Flores in southern Uruguay...

Read more here:
http://horsetalk.co.nz/2013/10/03/uruguay-dominates-pan-american-endurance-champs/#axzz2gxDgGhMV

Malaysia: Month of Global Events

NST.com.my

3 October 2013

1. Sultan Mizan Cup 2013
Terengganu International Endurance Park, Setiu (Oct 4-6)

After its rebranding two years ago, the Sultan Mizan Cup 2013 has gained reputation as a world-class premier endurance event with past riders coming from France, Australia, Slovakia, Indonesia, Singapore and Thailand.
Formerly known as the Sultan’s Cup Terengganu Endurance Challenge, which has been ongoing since 2007, the annual event is fast gaining interest from locals especially the younger generation who are interested in equestrian, recreational horse riding and endurance racing.

The 120km race is held at the Terengganu International Endurance Park in Lembah Bidong in the district of Setiu, 50km north of Kuala Terengganu. Regarded as one of the world’s top notch endurance riding village, the park offers visitors and competitors the best of Malaysia’s hospitality.

During the race, riders are expected to have an arduous journey through an oil palm plantation, along the coastline and canal banks as well as through forests to get to the finishing line.

The last two races were won by Thailand’s Wipawan Pawitayalarp, who was also the first woman rider to win the Sultan Mizan Cup.

Read more here:
http://www.nst.com.my/life-times/holiday/month-of-global-events-1.367102

The First Italian World Championships Was A Brilliant Success

Horsereporter.com - Full Article

By Pamela@horsereporter
September 30, 2013

The World Championships Young Horses held for the first time in our country ended last night with the closing ceremony and with the awards officialized by the FEI president Ian Williams. The World Champion title went to the French Aurelien Rocchia who rode Secret de mon Coeur. The second was the Spanish Silvia Yebra Altimiras, while the third was another French, Laurent Mosti.

There has been a strong urge and desire to impress and to leave the mark in occasion of the first World Championships Young Horses held in Italy. The dream of the organizing Committee of Garda Endurance Cup, the company which hosted the sporting event at the feet of the picturesque castle in Valeggio sul Mincio, has largely come true.

The special edition of the FEI World Championships Young Horses 2013 gave the thousands of people who rushed to the splendid Parco Giardino Sigurtà from Thursday to Saturday authentic, electrifying emotions...

Read more here:
http://www.horsereporter.com/?p=8009

Sheikh Mohammed: Swiss Federation questions inquiry

A leading equestrian federation has questioned the independence of a probe into Sheikh Mohammed's equine business.

Former London police chief Lord Stevens was called in by the sheikh's wife to oversee an internal inquiry after illegal veterinary drugs were seized from a stables and private jet.

Sheikh Mohammed is the world's biggest owner of racehorses, but the latest questions focus on endurance racing.

The Swiss federation's Claude Nordmann would prefer an external investigation.

[More ...]

International Equestrian Federation to introduce injury surveillance system over allegations of horse deaths

Telegraph.co.uk - Full Article

The governing body of equestrian sport has pledged to introduce an injury surveillance system (ISS) this autumn in response to allegations that dozens of horses die each season while competing in Middle East endurance racing.

By Pippa Cuckson
10:00PM BST 01 Oct 2013

Following lobbying from European federations, who have observed a link between endurance racing in the Middle East and stress fractures, the International Equestrian Federation (FEI) has decided to monitor injuries more closely.
In Europe and North America, endurance racing is slower paced but the Middle Eastern sport often produces average speeds of 26kph on 160 kilometre (100 mile) championship tier rides.

Last year, a study in the British Veterinary Journal highlighted injury-inducing averages of 35kph in the last 15-20km of the straighter, flatter desert tracks.

Two recent seizures of unlicensed drugs – one in Newmarket in August and the other on a private jet at Stansted in May – were both linked to Sheikh Mohammed, the world’s ­leading racehorse owner and current endurance world champion.
They included extensive anti-inflammatories and analgesics which Swiss equestrian federation president Charles Trolliet, also a vet, described as the “classic endurance cocktail”...

Read more here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/othersports/10348317/International-Equestrian-Federation-to-introduce-injury-surveillance-system-over-allegations-of-horse-deaths.html

Sheikh Mohammed under further scrutiny as trainer banned for doping continues to work in his Dubai stables

Telegraph.co.uk - Full Article

Sheikh Mohammed has opened himself up to further embarrassment following news that a former trainer who was banned for doping continues to work at Dubai stables owned by the Godolphin boss.

By Telegraph Sport
5:30PM BST 01 Oct 2013

Mubarak bin-Shafya was banned from endurance racing for two years in 2011 after several of his horses tested positive for stanozolol.

However, that has not prevented him from training thoroughbreds from the Al Aasfa Stables, owned by the Sheikh, near Dubai City.

And while there is no suggestion Sheikh Mohammed is involved in wrongdoing, the ongoing link with Bin Shafya, who is also a former colleague of disgraced Godolphin trainer Mahmood al-Zarooni, will cast yet further suspicion on the endurance horse operation.

More than 20 endurance horses trained in Dubai at stables owned variously by Sheikh Mohammed and other senior members of the Maktoum family have been involved in doping cases since 2005.

According to publicly available archives, 16 of the horses tested positive in competition to natural or manufactured steroids...

Read more here:
http://www.telegraph.co.uk/sport/horseracing/10346444/Sheikh-Mohammed-under-further-scrutiny-as-trainer-banned-for-doping-continues-to-work-in-his-Dubai-stables.html