Christie’s International Real Estate Vaulting competition will open tomorrow and continue throughout the week at the Indoor Arena at TIEC.
Spectators can expect an exciting mix of energy, athletic powers and theatrical skills when Christie’s International Real Estate’s Vaulting discipline opens its gymnastics on horseback at the FEI World Equestrian Games™ Tryon 2018 on Tuesday, September 18. The Indoor Arena at Tryon International Equestrian Center will be a bubbling cauldron of music, noise and anticipation.
Originally recognized as a discipline to help introduce children to horses, Vaulting has been coming of age for many years on the international competition scene. The Nations Cup™ competition for teams and two individuals per country is the newest addition to the discipline apart from the set of individual titles for females and males, for pairs and teams of six members.
Individual medals are decided after four starts. The athletes show compulsories with eight movements, followed by a technical program that sees five movements arranged according to their own choice. Their freestyle of one minute each is shown twice.
Squads will ride three rounds each counting towards their title, opening with compulsories followed by the freestyle over four minutes and shown twice. Up to three Vaulters will be on horseback at the same time building intricate figures that might make any circus artist turn pale.
The Vaulting horses are the true heroes of the sport. It is important they keep their stride and along with their nerves amidst the noise and excitement in the arena, which can hold up to 5,000 spectators.
Lots of time is spent on the choice of music and costume to underline a performance’s artistic theme. Germany’s Jannis Drewell’s interpretation of “Pirates of the Caribbean” rocked the Vaulting World Cup Final™ in early 2018. He will perform and compete to a soundtrack of “Dancing with Wolves” at Tryon 2018.
The fight for the titles at WEG is wide open since all but one individual titleholder from 2014 have left the sport. Anna Cavallaro from Italy, winning a Silver medal in France, is the only one left in contention. The 32-year-old doctor is still going strong as the current world ranking’s No.1.
Austrian pair Lindner/Wacha are aiming to defend their Pas de Deux title but have been overtaken by German combination Bresch/Jacobs at the World Cup Final™. It will be interesting to see how both pairs will stand up against Silvia Stopazzini and Lorenzo Lupacchini, the Italian combination ranks as the current world’s No.1.
The team’s competition has seen a constant change of titleholders since the first WEG in 1990 with Germany snatching the medals to the Team USA winning in Kentucky 2010. Both teams met head-to-head at Aachen in July but the U.S. squad competed on a leased horse. For Tryon 2018, the Pacific Coast Vaulting Club have brought experienced 15-year-old mare, Diva 506.
Team Vaulting is still considered the base of the discipline. Many individual Vaulters start their career driven by the support from their peers within a squad. Tryon 2018 will see several contestants appearing solo and within their team.