We spent the day at the 30th annual Göteborg Horse Show, which I have attended every year since the early 1980s (more precisely, I think I went for the first time in 1982). The program today consisted of a speed class to start with, the Young Rider (under 21) final, a display by police dogs and their handlers, mounted games featuring teams from Sweden, England, Scotland and Ireland and another pair of jumping classes to finish the day off.
As usual, the course was lovely, with the spectacular flower arrangements that have been the show’s signature since it started, and the crowd very loud and appreciative. Each year several riders comment on how much they enjoy riding in Scandinavium (the arena used for the event) since the audience here is quite unusual compared to in many other countries. In particular, its much younger and much more vocal. Some of the televised events I have seen from other arenas have featured a notably older and more ... well ... upper-class crowd. Here, you get a lot of horse-mad girls in their teens, and they’re not shy about letting everyone know who their favourite riders are.
I remember the first years that I attended the show, and how the big favourite at the time was Hugo Simon. Short, chunky and not young even then, but the ‘We Love Hugo!’ banners filled the arena even so. Then there was the John Whitaker and Milton era and, more recently, the favourite has been Rodrigo Pessoa and his ... boisterous Baloubet de Rouet. I also remember how, in those early years, a Swede in the arena meant that 16 faults (four fences down) was common and 8 faults was a great achievement. These days, we expect them to win, and this show has had so much to do with producing all the great riders we currently have here in Sweden.
In addition to watching the various events, we also made our way through the equestrian trade show that has been hosted together with the competitions for quite some years now. As always, it made me wish I had a horse, so I could justify buying lots of trendy clothing for myself and cool new must-haves for my horse. In the end, I went away with nothing more three bags of horse treats, flavoured with apple, mint and meadow herbs. The lovely boots were sold out in size 38 (and pretty darn expensive anyway, at 2300 SKr or around $300), all the shirts were in pink, blue, pale yellow or mint-green (I hate pastels) and I couldn’t quite make up my mind about the gorgeous Kyra Kyrklund coat that was down from 1995 ($260) to 1000 ($130).
But, we’re going again on Sunday, and I know there’ll be some more special deals then, so who knows what I’ll end up with.