By Liz Halliday-Sharp
Eventing is certainly a sport that demands resilience. It’s dangerous and challenging, and requires hours of training and perseverance. The feeling after a successful weekend of competition can be truly addicting and is what spurs on so many of us to keep working harder. But what about the weekends that are a total disaster? How we all deal with the good, the bad and the ugly is what really defines our strength as event riders.
This topic is particularly close to my heart after facing one of the most disheartening and disappointing weeks that I’ve had in years at the Maryland 5 Star at Fair Hill. October was a wild month for me with multiple competitions both in Europe and the USA, and it really felt like the dream coming true to have enough good horses at a high level to bounce between big FEI events around the world. After a great top-five result in the Boekelo CCIO4* in the Netherlands, I was excited to race back to the USA to compete at the Maryland 5 Star with both Cooley Quicksilver and Deniro Z.
Both of these horses are seasoned, experienced five-star competitors, so I arrived with high hopes for a good result. Our initial bit of drama began at the first horse inspection, where Deniro Z was held, and ultimately not accepted. This was a huge blow to me, my team and his owners, and was also a tremendous shock as he had felt completely sound in the days leading up to the jog. It appears that he bruised his foot, maybe even on the stones at the venue, and while he was fine on the soft ground, he was the slightest bit sore on the hard jog strip. At the time, it was frustrating, embarrassing and devastating all at once, but in hindsight I believe that everything happens for a reason and perhaps the universe had other plans for us rather than the five-star that weekend. I am of course also relieved that I didn’t compete Deniro if he was not 100%, and after some foot packing and two easy days, he was back to himself again and we had to just put it down to terrible timing.
After dealing with the disappointment that we faced with Deniro, I then tried to put all of my focus into Cooley Quicksilver, known as Monster. I knew that he was the fittest he had ever been and that he had successfully completed three other CCI5* events before, including finishing fifth in the Luhmühlen CCI5* earlier in the year, and I felt that we had a real chance at a top placing. After a solid dressage test that put us in fifth place, we were first to leave the start box on Saturday and I was prepared to fight hard for a good result. I remember thinking that Monster was not his normal, cheeky self in the warm-up, but at the time I didn’t overthink it and just tried to stay focused on the task ahead as he was still jumping well. Once we got out on course, however, I noticed that Monster didn’t seem to have the scope or the jump that he usually does. It was a difficult position to be in, as he was still answering the questions and galloping pretty well, but he felt under-powered and not like the horse that I know. I ultimately made the difficult decision to pull him up part way around rather than try and finish the course, as it was clear that something wasn’t right. After checking him out thoroughly, we discovered that the poor boy did indeed have a virus, which explained a lot! He is a real fighter for going around so much of the track feeling subpar, and I’m so glad that I retired him on course when I did. Monster is thankfully now 100% healthy and enjoying a much-deserved holiday!
It has been a long time since I’ve had a competition go quite so horribly wrong, and it was a reminder to me that eventers need tenacity and determination. It’s easy to always remember the good days, and when things are going well and there’s no better feeling, but it’s how you deal with the bad days that defines you. On the Sunday night of Maryland, I got on a plane to France for the 7-Year-Old World Championships in Le Lion D’Angers, so I had plenty of time to think things through. What I realized is the very best event riders in the world all have bumps in the road more regularly than we think, but what makes them great is their resilience, their love of the sport and their ability to always look forward, keep improving and never stop fighting.
Caption:
Liz, on Cooley Quicksilver, knows that as an eventer, facing bumps in the road is inevitable.
Photo by Shannon Brinkman
