Bring on the World Equestrian Games

Well, I’m back after a long weekend that was insanely awesome on multiple accounts, the most of which revolved around the most awesome boot sale known to man where my best friend and I both left with a pair of matching boots, and me with a second pair of boots, all for only $100.

Now, I could blog about my awesome weekend – but most of you read about that on Facebook. I could even blog about how much turning 30 scared the living hell out of me, but it actually wasn’t near as bad as I expected … in fact, I think I’m quite comfortable with it. If that doesn’t scream maturity, I don’t know what does – but blogs screaming maturity don’t really make for good reading.

Instead, I’ve decided to unleash my inner-cynic.
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And now, ladies and gentlemen (drumroll, please) – it’s Trysh vs. the World Equestrian Games.

Before the last few years, did any of you know that the World Equestrian Games even existed? I know I didn’t. In those last few years, though, I’ve learned that they do, in fact, exist; they do, in fact, cause massive amounts of development to take place unnecessarily; and they do, in fact, cause a massive uproar for nothing.

Let’s start out with a little history, shall we?

The games have been held every four years, halfway between sets of consecutive Summer Olympic Games, since 1990.
Wow. They’ve been around for 20 years. All I have to say is when I first heard about the major hoops Lexington was jumping through to host this competition, I thought it was older than I am. Apparently not. Wow, being that I’ve got 10 years on the competition, I wonder how many hoops I could get the Lexington government to jump through for me.

The FEI World Equestrian Games are the major international championships for equestrianism, considered by many horsemen to be more important than the Olympics.
Now really, they are comparing a 20-year-old competition to the Olympics, really? That’s like comparing an amoeba to a human in evolutionary terms. I mean, come on people.

Of course, it shouldn’t really come as a surprise that people make that comparison. We all know horse people are snobby as hell and narcissistic to boot. Don’t you go scoffing at me – I don’t mean any person with a horse, I mean “horse people.” You know who I mean. And if you don’t then you obviously don’t know any horse people, and therefore you should skip to the next point.

As of 2010, 57 countries are represented by 800 people and their horses.
Really, wow. I’m impressed. At the 2008 Summer Olympics there were 10,500 competitors from 204 countries. Yep, that’s comparable. Of course this is more important than the Olympics. Silly me.

The 2010 FEI World Equestrian Games in Lexington, Kentucky marked a series of firsts in WEG history: the first time WEG were held outside of Europe; the first time that championships for all eight FEI disciplines were held at one location (the Kentucky Horse Park); and the first time WEG had a title sponsor (in this case the animal health and nutrition group corporation Alltech, headquartered in the nearby city of Nicholasville).
Well, you know, the Olympics are usually brought to you by Coke, so why not sponsor the World Equestrian Games?

I’m truly shocked, though, that with that overwhelming capacity of 800 participants and their horses, that they didn’t have to spread to multiple locations to hold all the competitions. Bravo, way to go Kentucky, to house all of that. Just think, because Lexington could handle that, maybe we should be in the running for the 2020 Summer Olympics. Chicago couldn’t  get it for 2016, but I don’t see why Lexington can’t, after all, it did successfully house a competition for 800 people.

Permanent upgrades added to the Kentucky Horse Park leading up to the event included the completion of a 6,000 seat, climate-controlled indoor arena and completion of a 7,500 seat outdoor stadium.
Yes, permanent upgrades that degrade the beauty that once was the Kentucky Horse Park, and that we all paid for with our tax dollars to house this bust of a horse competition. Wow, why wouldn’t anyone who lives in and around Lexington not be bitter about this? (And if you’re not, you’re one of those snobby horse people.)

Now what are they going to do with the arena and stadium? They tried to do basketball there, but even that got moved to Frankfort (so I’ve been told). Now what? Will they try to turn the Kentucky Horse Park into a concert venue like they do with every other place in Kentucky? After all, we’ve had concerts at Kentucky Motor Speedway, Churchill Downs, Applebee’s Park – why not add the Horse Park to that list? Gotta make use of the stadium and arena somehow. Can you imagine the venue fees they will tack onto any ticket prices to recoup the money they wasted to build them? To think I thought a $13 venue fee for a concert at Rupp was bad.

They estimated that we’d have an extra 250,000 people in the Central Kentucky area for these games. Alas, only 60,000 tickets were actually sold. A lot of them were local, people wanting to take part in the “history in their backyard.” (Hahahahaha) A lot of them that weren’t local never showed thanks to our burgeoning economy (thanks, Obama!).

We were led to believe that if we wanted any sense of normalcy, we should bunker down in our houses like they are bomb shelters. If you didn’t have a stockpile of food to last you through the three weeks of the World Equestrian Games, and you would have to venture out to the store, or worse, a restaurant, then shame on you. Traffic would be an abomination, you’d best leave an hour and a half before needing to get to work in order to make it through all the traffic.

Let me tell you, I live not far from the Horse Park, traffic has not been up, save for the clusterfuck they turned Ironworks Pike into. (Might I point out that they put cops out there, but most of the time they sat in their cars, watching people sit at the exit 120 off-ramp trying to turn left for 10-15 minutes before they finally got their lazy asses up to direct traffic. Forgive me if I don’t just explode with my overwhelming gratitude to Lexington Police Department.) But I have not had any problems going shopping, going out to eat, or even commuting to and from work. Just another example of the boy crying wolf.

Now, I really must ask, do they go all crazy like this for the games in Europe? I seriously doubt it. I could be wrong, I haven’t been there during the four-year frenzy prior to the second-biggest let-down in history (preceded only by Plymouth Rock).

Ah well, at least I have a great story to tell my grandkids.

Oh, wait, no I don’t.




* All facts and figures are quoted from Wikipedia, which is not the most ideal source, but the best one I could do in the limited amount of time in which I am squeezing this rant into my day.