Eventing World Championships
The World Equestrian Games (WEG) originally comprised the World Championships for eight equestrian sports; dressage, driving, endurance, eventing, jumping, para dressage, reining and vaulting.
The Games are held every four years, two years prior to the Olympic Games, and are governed by the Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI).
In 2022 the World Championships were held at multiple locations and were not known as the World Equestrian Games.
History of the FEI World Equestrian Games
The first World Equestrian Games were held in Stockholm in 1990 and incorporated the six equestrian disciplines of Jumping, Dressage, Eventing, Driving, Endurance and Vaulting.
In 1994 the city of The Hague in the Netherlands hosted the Games. After a late cancellation of the Games that were to be held in Dublin, Ireland, Rome stepped forward to host the 1998 Games on one year's notice. All disciplines except the Endurance were held in Rome; the Endurance competition was hosted by Dubai that year.
From Europe to the USA
Jerez de Frontera, Spain hosted the Games in 2002 and Reining was brought in as a discipline.
The Games went to Aachen 2006, again with seven disciplines, and in 2010 Games were hosted outside of Europe for the first time.
The Kentucky Horse Park in Lexington, Kentucky was the 2010 venue and, for the first time, Para Dressage, the newest FEI Discipline was included as the eighth discipline. Another first in Kentucky was that the Games had a naming rights sponsor, the Lexington based organisation, Alltech.
In 2014, Normandy hosted the seventh edition of the FEI World Equestrian Games, also sponsored by Alltech, which took place in August 2014 at various venues in and around the historic town of Caen in Normandy, France
Tryon WEG 2018 beset with problems
The original host city for the 2018 FEI World Equestrian Games, Bromont (CAN) pulled out due to funding problems in mid-2016 and was replaced by Tryon International Equestrian Centre in North Carolina (USA).
With only 18 months to prepare and Hurricane Florence bearing down on North Carolina just as the Games were about to begin, the 2018 Tryon World Equestrian Games was beset with problems, particularly in the discipline of Endurance
Following a review of the planning and delivery of the Tryon 2018 Games by the FEI General Assembly in late 2018, a decision was made to open up the bidding process for individual world championships in all disciplines for 2022, but with preference being given to multi-discipline bids
FEI Secretary General Sabrina Ibáñez stressed that “This does not necessarily mean the end of the FEI World Equestrian Games and bids to host all-discipline Games will still be considered.”
FEI World Championships 2022
Following submissions to and recommendations by the FEI Board, there were no World Equestrian Games in 2022 but two individual venues hosted multi-discipline FEI World Championships
The World Championships for Jumping, Dressage, Para Dressage and Vaulting was staged in Herning (DEN) in August 2022. The Danish city, which runs a qualifier for the FEI Dressage World Cup annually, previously hosted a multi-discipline equestrian event in 2013 when it staged the FEI European Championships for Jumping, Dressage and Para-Dressage.
Eventing at Pratoni 2022
Pratoni del Vivaro (ITA), venue for the Eventing discipline at the Rome 1960 Olympic Games, hosted the FEI World Championships for Eventing and Driving in September 2022.
The Italian venue, located 35 kilometres south of Rome, was no stranger to hosting high-level equestrian events and FEI Championships. It was the site for the cross country competition at the FEI World Equestrian Games 1998 and hosted the FEI World Driving Championships for Singles in 2006 and 2010.
The 2022 FEI World Championship in Eventing took place from 14th -18th September with Germany taking yet another team gold World Championship on 95.2 total points.
Strong performances by Michael Jung, who missed out on individual honours when the poles fell in the showjumping phase on the final day, and his team mates Julia Krajewski, Sandra Auffarth, and Christoph Wahler secured the win.
Second place went to the United States of America, their first World Championship medal in 20 years, with 100.3 points while New Zealand bumped Great Britain out of the medals by a hair, winning 100.7 points to Britain’s 100.9 for the bronze.
Britain's Yasmin Ingham secured the Individual World Championship on board Banzai Du Loir with Germany's team gold medallist Julia Krajewski also taking individual silver and New Zealand's Tim Price securing individual bronze
