Equitana Open Air at Neuss

Equitana Open Air at Neuss (GER) 6/6/98

The Equitana Equestrian Sports World Fair is the biggest equestrian trade fair in Europe. Held every other year in the huge exhibition center at Essen in Nordrhine-Westfalia. This year the organizers came out with a new idea: ‘The Equitana Open Air’ at the property of the Neusser Horse-Racing-Club at Neuss near Düsseldorf. The main purpose of this event was to present the many different sorts of racing and riding styles one can find all over Gemany today.

When we approached the city of Neuss, a heavy thunderstorm with pouring rain was right above us. We had to slow to a crawl because visibility went down to less than 30 yards. Nice prospects for visting an open air event! But after 15 minutes the storm disappeared as fast as it came and when we arrived at the racing ground, the sun was beaming again, with just a little water dripping from the ancient trees that frame the entry of the Racing-Club’s property to remind us of the heavy downpour.

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The showground was built on the big meadow inside the racing oval. Besides many vendor booths for tack and horse-equipment and (of course) food and beverages, the organizers had several arenas for performances and horse shows. The shows were performed simultaneously in the different arenas, so you could chose to watch whatever you like at any time. The shows included a Western-Riding competition, dressage performances, breeder’s presentations, jumping, driving and leisure riding. In one corner we saw a driving school, open to the visiors for free where you could practice how to back a horse-trailer into a parking space or a garage

The most striking difference to the Essen fair (which is an indoor exhibition) was the fact that this place had so much open space between the arenas and the booths, giving plenty of room for the crowd thus everybody had a fair chance of watching whatever they would like.

arab.jpg (13581 Byte) After getting the tickets (DM 10.- per piece, that is about $5.60), we entered the showground and passed some vendor booths and made our first stop at the breeder’s arena. Here you could see all sorts of breeds: Arabian horses, QH, Haflinger-breeds, Trakehnian and Westphalien horses as well as pony breeds, Holsteiner and Hanoveranian horses, to name but a few. Most of the mares were presented together with their foals which - of course - conquered the hearts of the spectators. I was fascinated by a little Arabian foal named ‘Kyra’ (photo) who already showed a most remarkable trot action.
When we stopped here for the first time, the presentation of ‘Deutsches Reitpony’ (German Riding-Pony) was running. This is not really a breed but a category where you may register any horse - independent of breed - that has a pedigree and was born and raised inside Germany, and will - as a grown-up - not exceed a hight of 1.48m (about 14 hands 2 inches). The appearance of these horses has changed quite remarkably during the last two decades from a typical pony to real (small) horse exterior. The breeders breed for a small horse exterior and for character, because this is meant to be a horse for kids and youngsters.

western.jpg (11053 Byte) Attracted by the loudspeaker announcements, we went over to the Western-Rider’s arena. They just started a Western-Riding competition. We were amused to hear the judge giving his commands in English and in the corresponding German translation. Western riding is very popular over here though many so called ‘Westernreiter’ mistake the term with: „I cannot really ride, but I have a horse, a Western saddle and equipment - so I’m a Western Rider“. Of course the participants of the competition didn’t belong to that category.

drive.jpg (10968 Byte) We then went to the drivers arena, where a pairs competition was going on. The course consisted of several narrow gates, made from plastic pipes, that had to be passed by the carriages in the enumerated sequence without touching them. On top of each pipe a little ball was mounted. Aside from that there was a serpentine, also marked by plastic pipes and a passage with a 90 degree turn, marked by tubes, mounted (not fixed) on short logs. The competitioners had to complete the course within the time limit. We really saw some action here, especially when a drver missed the order of the obstacles and had to search the next one in the row thus losing valuable time.

foodboth.jpg (12533 Byte) When we walked over to the dressage arena, the speaker announced a lunch break. We decided to have a ‘meal’ too at one of the numerous booths. What a surprise when we met some friends from our Solingen home. For ‘lunch’, we had some French fries and a so called ‘Currywurst’ which is a fried sausage with Curry-spiced ketchup. This ‘dish’ is the German equivalent of hot-dogs or burgers in the US.

to be continued on next page