By Robert Dover

Today, I get asked two questions all the time:

• “ How can I become successful and make my riding dreams come true when I do not have the money I need for horses, training, and competing?”

• “How can I get a sponsor?”

These are both legitimate questions, especially in a time when a great horse may cost hundreds of thousands, if not millions, of dollars. I always consider the person who asks me these questions and that rider’s ultimate goal, whether it is the Olympics or to be a good professional trainer in a specific area of the country. I explain the hard work, dedication, focus, humility, sense of humor, honesty, and grit required of anyone seeking to be excellent in any endeavor in life. I also emphasize the need to love and embrace the road being traveled—its highs and lows, successes and failures—in order to find true happiness along the way.

Finally, I tell it like it is, explaining that there are normally two reasons someone chooses to sponsor a rider: Either the sponsor has an emotional attachment to that person and wishes to help as a parent might help a child, or the sponsor is attracted to the prior and potential achievements of the rider and wants to become a part of that success story.

Read more: Three Ways to Find Your Way - An Excerpt from "The Gates to Brilliance"

By Chris Lombard

The dirt road to the farmhouse was dark and tangled. I turned on the dome light to look at the directions she had given me. The windows were down, letting in a cool breeze and the sound of car wheels over gravel. Like a flashlight in a cave the headlights lit the road and the walls of thick Maine woods to each side, and I watched the farm appear out of the darkness. I hoped the drive would be longer, just a bit more road. I wanted time. Maybe to think about what I wanted to say.

Maybe to just delay the inevitable.

As I walked up to the front door, I felt like I was going into the job interview of a lifetime.

“Did you find the place okay?” Allison asked as I stepped inside.

“Yes,” I said. I was nervous, that twist in my stomach like when we were on our first date. Her hair was down over her shoulders. Long, dark, with that slight curl at the bottom it sometimes had. Usually in the mornings. Perfectly spread over the pillow beside me.

She was house-sitting, taking care of the farm and its animals. She asked if I would like something to drink and then silently showed me around, going through the motions as if we were mere acquaintances. Neither one of us made the move to talk, letting the thickness in the air grow. And then, like she didn’t know what else to do, she said it was time to take care of the horses…I could come with her to the barn if I wanted.

Allison fed the two horses while I sneezed and rubbed my itchy, watering eyes. Hay fever. It hit the moment I even thought about going near a barn.

“Wow. Horses are big,” I said, nose all stuffed up.

“They are but they don’t know it,” she replied as she filled their water buckets.

I stood there, eyes feeling puffy and red. The horses were beautiful in their form; I couldn’t believe this was the first time in my life I had seen one up close. I suddenly felt foolish for not ever doing this before. I liked their sounds and motions while they ate. It made me feel good. They would grab a bite of hay and then raise their heads to look at me while they chewed, then grab another bite and raise their heads again to look at me, all very content in… their world.

Read more: In Their Eyes - Book Excerpt from Land of the Horses

As a credentialed member of the press, we’re happy we covered the 2021 Equine Affaire Eastern States Exposition in West Springfield, MA on November 11th – 14th. Equine Affaire is North America’s premiere equine exposition and equestrian gathering . . . a unique celebration of the horse offering unparalleled education, entertainment, and shopping opportunities.

Here are some of our favorites from this exciting exposition and trade show. And check out the VIDEOS on our YouTube Channel!

See the PHOTO GALLERY Equine Affaire 2021

By Andrea Kutsch

The problem with most horsemanship instruction is that the reader can interpret the written word in many ways. In addition, every person who is involved with horses interprets horse behavior in a different way, according to the person’s own experiences. It is, therefore, very important that we agree on a “common denominator” and accept something that has been scientifically examined and proven: Horses fundamentally do not mean us any harm.

The equine nervous system processes signals that affect the horse incredibly quickly, especially on an emotional level. The human nervous system tends to act more on a strategic, planning level. Horses need to act quickly to ensure their survival. One wrong decision can have fatal consequences. When confronted with an external stimulus, horses have to decide whether to leave the situation—take flight—or to stay and wait to see what happens, focus, and attack if necessary. They have the option of driving away the stimulus or the person influencing their behavior.

Emotionally relevant external stimuli that have an effect on the horse have been scientifically proven to also have a major direct influence on the release of hormones controlled by the brain. These hormones then have a lasting impact on how the horse will behave in similar situations in the future.

Read more: Horses Can’t See Ghosts - an Excerpt from "From the Horse’s Point of View"

By Bob Velin

In the early-morning hours of October 10, 2019, the life of Errol Spence Jr., one of the boxing’s brightest pay-per-view stars and undefeated boxing champion changed in a flash.

Driving his $300,000 Ferrari 488 Spider at frighteningly high speeds on the streets of downtown Dallas, Texas, where he resided – he'd been drinking and wasn't wearing his seatbelt -- Spence, then 29, lost control of his car when he hit a median and was ejected through the windshield as the Ferrari cartwheeled multiple times and was totally destroyed. The entire crash was caught on tape by a nearby security camera.

Miraculously, Spence, nicknamed “The Truth,” not only survived but suffered no broken bones and only some facial cuts and the loss of a couple teeth. Just a few weeks removed from successfully defending his welterweight titles, the boxer quickly realized he had cheated death and lived to talk about it.

“I don’t know how or why I got saved, but thank God,” he later wrote on Instagram. “The thought of leaving my (three) little girls and them growing up without me still (messes) with me, but I’m triple blessed and must be here for a reason . . . My accident slowed me down and gave me a different perspective on (things) I was taking for granted.”

Armed with a new lease on life, Spence found that new perspective in a nearly 60-acre ranch he purchased in DeSoto, Texas, just south of Dallas.

“I was just trying to find answers, you know? I needed to go somewhere new and start over and get out of that dark cloud that was downtown,” he said in a recent interview, “and be in a better element, because I’m already like an introvert; I don’t like being around people that much anyway.

Read more: Champion Boxer Finds Peace and a Second Chance with Horses

By Jim Wofford

My magical 1962 summer started as soon as I landed in Ireland. Imagine getting in a taxi at the old Dublin Airport and immediately falling into a serious debate with the driver as to whether Arkle or Mill House was the greatest steeplechaser that Ireland had ever produced, or “was dere a better in all tha Emerald Isle?” By the time I got to my destination, I had a lead on two of the “greatest young leppers” the world had ever seen, a tip on the 4:30 race at Punchestown Racecourse, and an invitation to an IRA fundraiser that evening at The Grasshopper, in the village of Clonee.

It was a wet summer, even for Ireland. The sun was out the morning I landed in Dublin and shone again the day I left—and it rained every day in between. When I mentioned this, I was told, “Yes, but it’s a dry rain.” The Irish have a subtle conception of the truth.

Despite the weather, I rode young sales horses every day for the next few weeks. The Captain had a steady stream of clients, and John and I presented likely prospects to them. Whatever technique and polish I had gained at Culver was going to have to suffice; at that time, the Irish were long on horse sense, but short on technique. It took a fair amount of “git ‘er done” to ride uneducated young stock over colored poles and up and down the few banks and ditches we had on the place.

I was on a strawberry roan mare one morning and had gotten the bucks out of her by the time The Captain drove up. I showed him her new tricks by circling a few times, riding a couple of figure eights, and changing back and forth from trot to canter. The Captain seemed happy enough with the progress of her flatwork and told me to pop her over the bank at the end of the field. “Okay,” I said. “Has she been over it before?” “Ah, no,” was the reply, “but her dam was a great lepper.” I wouldn’t say this one was great, but she had a good attitude, and we eventually scrambled back and forth successfully. I learned a lot about horses that summer, including what happened when horses from a good gene pool crossed paths with enthusiastic ignorance. Horses have an extraordinary desire to please humans; they will put up with our most outlandish requests, if asked in a determined and confident manner. This was the first time I noticed this about horses, but it wouldn’t be the last.

Read more: Irish Summer - An Excerpt from Still Horse Crazy After All These Years

By: Sarah Hickner
Foreword By Natalie Mayrath

Even before Simone Biles pulled out of the Olympic Gymnastics Team Event in Tokyo, the reporter originally responsible for blowing open the Larry Nassar scandal published a headline that said: USA Gymnastics May Never Recover From Larry Nassar.

The New York Times reported that USA Gymnastics is “still struggling to recover.” That’s the understatement of the century!

As compounding allegations unraveled the USA Gymnastics image of pure dynasty, it became clear that a systemic failure to consider claims or alert authorities about repeated allegations of abuse had been, as one abused gymnast put it, rotting the organization from the inside. The initial Indianapolis Star report that opened the floodgates described an internal policy that “enabled predators to abuse gymnasts long after USA Gymnastics had received warnings.”

The warnings went unheeded. If you can stomach watching Nassar’s victims making their statements at his sentencing, you’ll hear each woman, one by one, repeat eerily similar stories, and you’ll notice the devastatingly common theme: The adults -- who ran the organizations which many of these girls devoted their lives to -- refused repeatedly to listen. It is crushing hearing many of them say they were silenced, dismissed, even belittled.

Molding top athletes for competition was the biggest priority. And so the vibrance of The Gold Medal Machine took precedence over the well-being of the children who served it, for decades.

Similarly, Anne Kursinski grew up riding in an equestrian dynasty environment at Flintridge. It was a who’s who of top riders, top horses, and the related social scene. There, she was bred to be a champion, which she absolutely is. But if you wanted to reach the elite level, you had to submit to the God-like trainer. And so it goes, for decades, the abuse was rampant. And Anne is also a horsewoman, a mentor, a survivor.

Read more: Decorated Olympian Shared Abuse Story to Save the Children

Gold Medal History Twice, Unsurprising Lone Dressage Score Finisher, Favorites Slip, Impact of Format & Frangibles, as Eventing Competition Concludes

By: Natalie Mayrath

Welcome to Tokyo Takeaways on StreamHorseTV! In this series StreamHorseTV will be talking Tokyo Equestrian with the lovely and knowledgeable Catie Staszak, international Show Jumping commentator, multimedia sports journalist, and CEO of Catie Staszak Media. We will provide discussion, insight and commentary around all the action happening on the ground during the Tokyo Olympic Equestrian Competitions.

We sum up an historic Olympics Eventing competition that saw the best ever team score in history, and the first-ever female gold medalist. While the two-time reigning gold medalist was pitted against the world-ranked number one rider, they both incurred jumping penalties to slip in the standings, dipping below our first female gold medalist, and an eventing legend in his eighth Olympic Games, who unsurprisingly was the only competitor to finish on his dressage score.

Gold Medal History -- Twice

The cross-country phase of three-day eventing usually proves influential, as Phillip Dutton described it. In these Tokyo Olympics, it caused some riders to slip in the standings, but it gave Great Britain their prelude to punching the best score ever recorded in Olympic Eventing history to claim the gold medal.

Australia took the silver in deserved fashion boasting the likes of Andrew Hoy, Kevin McNab, and Shane Rose. France, who won team gold in Rio, settled for bronze here.

Team Great Britain was flawless with three double-clear rounds on cross-country, and they sealed their powerhouse performance by turning in exemplary show jumping rounds, although they were so far ahead that they had many rails to spare. Staszak says, “they still had three rails in hand, it was so, so impressive.”

Also entering the record books is eventing’s first-ever female Olympic Gold medalist.

Read more: StreamhorseTV's Tokyo Takeaways - Eventing Recap

It's an exciting time for Equestrian events at the Tokyo Olympics. You can find a complete Schedule of Events HERE where you can Live Stream or see replays. Don't miss a thing!

In 1964 women were first allowed in this stadium in Tokyo. Now for the first time in history, a woman won Individual Eventing. Julia Krajewski for Germany wins the Gold medal and makes history as the first female winner in the Olympics in Individual Eventing!

You can find results in the Equestrian Medals Standings HERE.

Read more: Tokyo 2020 Olympics Equestrian Events