The Australian team at the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games 2010 Opening Ceremony Photo: Toni-anne Collins
In approximately 500 days, on August 23rd 2014, the Alltech FEI World Equestrian GamesTM 2014 in Normandy will be declared open.
In preparation for the big event, naming rights sponsor Alltech opened their Normandy office in the heart of the Games’ venue locations, the city of Caen, France. This is their third office in France after Nantes and Paris and the 33rd Alltech office in Europe and as a part of the celebrations they hosted 33 Alltech Official Partners from 21 countries
Here in Australia, where Alltech has had an office since 1997, HyGain was recently announced as the Australian partner for the Games at the Alltech Asia Pacific Lecture Tour in Melbourne
Matthew Smith, Director, Asia-Pacific (above) told us he is really looking forward to the 2014 Games, especially as his wife is a big fan of eventing and used to compete in the UK when they were living there. They now live in New Zealand and their new location once again has links with eventing.
“We live very close to where (London 2012 New Zealand bronze medalist) Jonathan Paget grew up” says Matthew “It’s a very horsey area and we love it”
For many in Australia the name Alltech has become much more familiar since the sponsorship of the Alltech FEI 2010 World Equestrian Games in their home town of Lexington, Kentucky. More recently Alltech has sponsored an eventing series here – the Alltech Equine Advantage Eventing Series which is being held as a part of five events in 2013 at 1* level. The winner of the final at Sydney International Horse Trials in 2014 wins a trip to the 2014 Games in Normandy.
If Kentucky was anything to go by, it will be a very good trip for whoever wins. In fact it may even be better, says Matthew
“We learned a lot from helping to organize the Games in Kentucky” he says “This time we are probably going to be a little more ‘hands-off’ but we certainly are contributing in many ways other than providing a 10 million Euro sponsorship”
We remember the 2010 WEG well and can’t wait for those 500 or so days to roll by until we’ll be in Normandy ………..
