Horse Sport

Jared Peterson, with the Jacksonville Calvary, clears a hurdle and landed in first place in individual standings after Thursday’s Speed Competition. Photo courtesy of glossyfinish.com

City League International jumped into its debut season at the Jacksonville Equestrian Center Friday with the first of a two-day team competition.
Mother Nature could not have been more cooperative. On such a gorgeous day, the center filled with both fans and excitement.
Riders from the 21 teams strolled around in their jerseys, exchanging greetings and developing a strategy for the competition. Each of the 21 teams consists of a captain and four riders.
The team competition is an entirely new thought process and strategy for state-side, grand prix-level competition. Traditionally, riders have competed individually, with the exception of Olympic events.  
City League’s format, however, is modeled after Olympic competition. Riders compete as a team for the first two days, then the performances kick up a notch with the grand-prix level individual competition Saturday evening.
Each team will be able to send out only one rider Saturday night, so captains will be searching for whoever has their “game on, both horse and rider.”  
“Spirits are high, riders are talkative, strategies are being discussed,” organizer Pauline Russell said.
City League has worked hard to bring this concept home and create fun-packed evenings for the spectators.
Along the way, the new league hopes to show everyone how the team concept works and invites fans to follow their teams throughout the 2008 season and beyond.
We will post results as they unfold