Two Days at Budapest Horse Show!!

Wow, I have had so much fun the past couple days.. so this entry will be super long!! I went to the horse show that they have been having in Budapest and it was a great experience. The main events were the show jumping classes, but the bulk of the time was taken up with exhibition riding and some ridiculous classes. I was going to try to write about everything in chronological order but I think that would take WAY too long, so instead I'll describe some of my favorites. Also, I have pictures but the combination of fast horses and dramatic lighting meant that most of my pictures were quite blurry - sorry!

There were more ridiculous relay races in this show than I have ever seen before. They had a class which was younger (teenage) riders. The ring was divided in half long ways, and they had to race against each other - each had their own six fence jumper course on their side of the arena. This wasn't particularly ridiculous, but for some reason, they had to wear a costume. Not the horses, just the riders. Also, they would announce the riders by their costume. So, two riders would come into the arena and the announcer would say, "ksfjowie lsdf oslfjwie sldfjkfj lkfjdsldkf BUMBLEBEE qwo MARIE ANTOINETTE!!" and then everyone would cheer.

Slightly more ridiculous was the family class. First a dog had to go through an agility course. Then a small child had to navigate an obstacle course, and tag a slightly older child, who would gallop his/her pony through a pole bending course. They had to do the whole thing twice through, so each team had two dogs, two ponies, three or four kids, and a smattering of adults who were crucial for the last portion. As soon as one team got through their relay section, a horn would sound, and all the teams would abandon what they were doing (this involved a lot of leaping off ponies) and then run to the end of the ring where they had to grab a rope and pull an Audi SUV for about 30 feet. This was my favorite part, because usually the smallest child would be left holding the ponies while the rest of the family pulled the rope and the dogs jumped around barking and generally going nuts. At one point, a pony escaped and ran around all crazy, which added to the overall chaos.

Still, the class that took the cake for ridiculous horse show classes was the "Audi Ride and Drive" class. (Audi was a major sponsor of the show.) I think the people taking part in this were Hungarian celebrities, because they certainly weren't good riders. I mean, they were good enough to get around a six fence course that looked like it was about 2'6", but it wasn't pretty - the horses they were riding were wonderfully tolerant. Here's what they had to do:

1. Jump a small course
2. Dismount their horse, hand it off, and then run into and out of a horse trailer (hitched to an Audi, of course)
3. Run to another corner of the ring where the world's naughtiest pony was being held. (I actually don't think the pony misbehaving was supposed to be part of the challenge, but more on that in a moment.)
4. Get on the pony and ride him down to the other end of the ring.
5. Jump three small obstacles
6. Get in an Audi convertible which was parked at one end of the ring and drive through an obstacle course.

Here is a picture but it really doesn't adequately capture the insanity:

There were 8 riders in the class. Here are some of the things that went wrong:

1. First rider fell off the pony three times. The pony did NOT want to go anywhere and would trot for a few steps and then abruptly stop and drop his shoulder. This guy did not stand a chance against the wiles of this pony, and after he feel off for the third time, they had one of the show workers lead the pony while the competitors rode.
2. Even with someone leading, a couple of the other riders fell off anyways because the pony was bouncy
3. One rider didn't turn quickly enough after a jump and nearly ran into the convertible.
4. A rider nearly hit the pony with the car
5. A rider hit a fence with the car - somewhere in Budapest, an Audi dealer is rues the day he agreed to let his car be used for this
6. Several riders fell as they dismounted their first horse
7. One rider failed to clear the third small obstacle that he was supposed to jump (height: less than a foot) and fell in the dirt.

The only thing that could have made this class better was if the Benny Hill theme was played.

There was a lot of exhibition riding. Several girls in a vaulting group showcased their talents. A man did some cool archery tricks from horseback. There was some natural horsemanship stuff and a "parade of Santas" - people dressed as Santas in driving teams of horses. These ranged from a Santa driving a team of five gorgeous Shires, to Santa pulled by eight miniature horses, to one Santa who was about 3 years old and "drove" the tiniest mini horse in the tiniest cart - mostly led by his mother. In Hungary, Santa is always accompanied by devils who punish bad children, so there were also devils on the carriages and riding around.

There were quite a few other driving classes. There were races, which gave me a feel for why chariot driving in ancient Rome was so popular - it was so exciting!!

There was also a driving drill team with 24 horses - 4 teams of 6!! This was SO cool, and I had fun identifying the various drill team moves. (They did the craziest pinwheel I have ever seen - it involved fireworks.)

All their horses were grey, too!

One of my favorite exhibitions was the Cossack riders. They were INSANE. Their horses would circle the arena at a dead gallop, and they would do all sorts of crazy tricks. Here is a YouTube video that has some footage from the group that I saw - the first minute is ridiculous but after that you can see some of the cool tricks. My favorite trick was when they would swing under the horse's neck and remount on the other side. We got to see a guy go under his horse's belly - it was incredible!

Here's a picture of the Cossack guys:

My favorite exhibition rider was actually part of another group. I couldn't ever get a good picture but here's one that gives the idea:

To clarify because it is blurry: that is a boy, who I guess to be around 10 years old, jumping his team of four ponies over a small fence while standing on the back two ponies. He also switched and rode them four abreast, standing on the middle two. This kid was also one of the devils in the Santa parade, and he rode a black pony - bareback, with no bridle, just a neck strap, which he never used. All the kids were standing along the edge of the arena, and he would gallop along and high-five all their outstretched hands. I expect this to be the only child in the world who would meet Bonine's expectations of appropriate riding abilities at 10 years old.

They also had an "American Wild West" portion. The first part was an incredibly non-PC, cringe-inducing "Cowboys and Indians" section - in America, someone would probably be sued for putting on such a production. There was also a cowboy "shoot-out", an incredibly low quality roping demonstration, and dramatically lit line dancing:

The show jumping classes were 1,5 meter classes - so about 5'. There were riders from all over Eastern Europe who came. The first day, I had a seat right up front by a triple oxer:

This was a good view but it did mean I couldn't see a few fences. Saturday night was the FEI World Cup Qualifier, so the arena was pretty packed and my seat was much higher up. This was fun though because it meant I could see the whole course.

Here's a picture of the course - this is actually quite a bit higher than my seat was. This is during the long break while they were setting up the course so there are lots of empty seats.

The red and white combination on the right hand side was the toughest part of the course - nearly every rider who pulled a rail did so on that vertical - the approach angle must have been really challenging. Riders would get applause for successfully navigating the triple combination, although once everyone realized that way more people were having trouble with the red and white fences, riders who made it through that combination clear were applauded as well.

I scoped out the riders while they were walking the course, and was successful in locating the most attractive rider on the Italian team:

This is who I was cheering for:

This is Roberto Arioldi, who rode for Italy. (This is actually a picture from an earlier class, but this is the horse he rode for the FEI class.) He rode a different horse in the 1,45 meter class on Friday and did a really great job. He consistently rode some of the fastest times - between his two horses, he rode in four different classes. In the 1,5 meter class, he came in 5th after dropping a rail in the jump-off. The best part was - and I didn't even realize this until the jump-off - was that he was competing against his daughter, who came in 4th. (Incredibly impressive, given the riding level and how many riders were in the class. Why was I not born into this family!?) They had won a pairs event together earlier in the day. Her horse is not as pretty as his.

The end of the show was very dramatic - the last rider was Jamie Wingrave, who is Hungarian and appears to be something of a rising star. He got a huge cheer every time he entered the ring, and the woman sitting next to me assured me that he is "...a very, very nice man, and his face also is very... nice." Of the seven riders who had already gone in the jump-off, two had been clear, so he'd have to jump a fast, clear round if he wanted to win. He had a great round, and the cheers and whistles started as he approached the final fence, which prompted the announcer to "shush" the crowd - and then as soon as his horse landed, the place erupted.

It was a great end to my time at the horse show. Here is the awards ceremony at the end - they were facing the other side of the ring but you get the idea.

He really whooped it up during his victory gallop - tossed his helmet to one of his support team, circled the arena, then pulled up his horse at the far end of the arena and threw his flowers into the crowd, and finally made a mad dash out of the arena.

Tonight we are going out for traditional Hungarian dinner, and tomorrow I'm going to do some sightseeing!