Contenders for the equestrian version of Twenty20 came head to head yesterday to start their preparations for one of the biggest equestrian challenges they have ever faced.
Olympic medallists, World Cup winners and winners of some of the most prestigious equestrian events across the world - Burghley, Badminton and Blenheim - started training for the Express Eventing International Cup.
British Olympic bronze medallist Tina Cook was announced as the latest to join the star-studded line up. Fellow Olympic bronze medallists Mary King and William Fox-Pitt, and Italian Vittoria Panizzon, Belgian Karin Donckers, German Dirk Schrade, Rodolphe Scherer, Philip Dutton, Australian Olympic silver medallists Lucinda and Clayton Fredericks, New Zealand Olympians Andrew Nicholson, Caroline Powell and Mark Todd, young Chinese star Alex Hua Tian, and Brits Oliver Townend and Lucy Wiegersma have all signed up.
The Express Eventing International Cup, in association with British Eventing, is a fast-paced, glamorous new form of the sport - condensing all the skills and excitement of traditional eventing into just half a day inside an enclosed sporting arena.
For the very first time, spectators will be able to watch all three disciplines - dressage, show jumping and cross-country - from one seat, and follow the progress of every horse and rider at each stage of the competition. Helped by expert commentaries, stadium audio visual technology and a simplified scoring system, they will know exactly what each competitor needs to do to win.
This new competition is designed to broaden the appeal of the sport, while providing a showcase competition for eventing's top riders. The inaugural event will be launched at the Millennium Stadium in Cardiff on 30 November 2008 and then rolled out as a series of international competitions in major sporting locations around the world.
 The express eventing competitors are raring to go. |
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