It’s chilly in Chile, but the heat is on at Pan American Games

The mountains that tower above the capital city of Santiago in Chile were shrouded in mist today, and there was a chill in the spring-season air. But at the Escuela de Equitación Regimiento Granaderos army base in nearby Quillota, the temperature was already rising as the Dressage horses came forward for the first Horse Inspection ahead of tomorrow’s opening day of equestrian action at the Pan American Games 2023.

Over the next two weeks the hopes and dreams of athletes, horse owners, breeders, supporters and fans from 19 countries across the Americas are hanging in the balance along with qualifying slots for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games. In Dressage only two teams will take Olympic tickets, and the countries chasing them down are Argentina, Brazil, Canada, Chile, Colombia, Ecuador and Mexico. 

The event venue is proving a big hit with riders, and many of the horses had a real spring in their step when trotted up before the Ground Jury today.

“It is beautiful here with the mountains as the backdrop, the arena is really nice and all the warm-ups too, the stabling is super, super nice and the people are amazing. The Chileans are so welcoming and very sweet to us!”, said Mathilde Blais Tetreault after presenting the 13-year-old gelding, Fedor, who will line out for Team Canada tomorrow afternoon. 

Small Tour combinations will compete in the morning followed by Big Tour combinations in the afternoon, and the Canadian will run 29th of the 36 partnerships when riding the Grand Prix in front of the judges panel of Michael Esinski (USA), Cara Witham (CAN), Cesar Torrente (COL), Magnus Ringark (SWE) and Carlos Lopes (POR).

It’s a real family effort where Blais Tetreault is concerned. The 13-year-old Dutch-bred Fedor belongs to her sister, Laurence, who also competes but who has chosen to pass the horse over and instead act as groom for her sibling this week.  “It’s really an amazing experience for us to be here together for my first Championship and to have her by my side!”, said Mathilde today.

She started training the horse for her sister “and the partnership ended up being really good between him and I and she had the graciousness to give me the ride on the horse - I will be forever grateful!”, she explained.

Team

There was a real sense of collaboration between the Ecuadorian team this morning too. Julio Mendoza Loor describes his side as “the three Ecuadorian Muskateers!” 

Carolina Espinosa and Maria Jose Granja are both based in their country’s capital city of Quito where Carolina works as a coach and horse-trainer. Her horse, Findus K, belongs to one of her clients and was bought in Germany as a three-year-old. Espinosa trained him up to Prix St Georges and Intermediate 1 level. “It’s been a long journey but he’s a very sweet horse”, she said.

Together they competed on the gold medal winning team at the Bolivarian Games in 2017 alongside Granja and Mendoza Loor, so this is a side that has already proven its worth and they have a podium placing in their sights over the next few days.

Granja’s stallion, Emiliano, is 21 years young and started out as a Jumping horse. She took him on to help with his flatwork and ended up competing him at the Bolivarian Games in 2013, but his career came to a shuddering halt due to a bout of colic a year later. As it happened what could have been a tragedy turned into a career-defining episode because when she paid for Emiliano’s colic surgery the owner gifted her the horse. 

“He was a year in the field afterwards, and then I took him back and started training again. He was 11 years old then and now we are here ten years later!” said the rider who works at a sports club in Quito as a coach and stable manager.

Describing Emiliano she said “he has a big heart in a small horse!” and team-mate Mendoza Loor agreed. “Actually we call him Napoleon because he doesn’t know he’s so small. He’s only 158cms but he has a big opinion of himself!”, Mendoza Loor pointed out.

He is based in North Carolina, USA and is the most experienced member of the Ecuadorian team. A Pan American Games veteran and three-time gold medallist at the Bolivarian Games, he also competed at the FEI World Equestrian Games in Tryon (USA) in 2018.

He will line out in the Grand Prix tomorrow afternoon with the 12-year-old KWPN gelding Jewel’s Goldstrike, and there is no doubting his ambition.

“I need to finish in the top two individuals here to get to the Olympics”, he explained simply, adding that the team “will give everything and fight for the medals!” over the next few days.

Home flag

Meanwhile Team Chile’s Mario Vargas (Kadeine), Carlos Fernandez (Heroe XXV), Virginia Yarus (Ronaldo) and Svenja Grimm (Doctor Rossi) are tasked with flying the home flag, and they are doing it with enormous pride.

“We actually have a really experienced team, one of the best Chile has ever had!”, said Grimm this evening. “Mario has a long history of competing in Pan American Games, I also have a lot of history riding, Virginia is located in Wellington, USA most of the time and she competed at the Tokyo Olympics for Chile as well and at many Pan American Games, and for Carlos it is his second Pan Americans, he also rode in Lima (2019). So we have four riders with a lot of experience behind us”, she explained.

She continued, “there’s been a turning point in the sport here. Chile was very strong in the early years of the Games because of our army riders, and there was a strong German influence with German trainers. Now we’ve reached a turning point again, there is a group of people working really hard to bring the sport forward and to make it stronger in this country and having this team here shows that there has been development”. She trained with Germany’s Jonny Hilberath earlier in her career and has been coached by Dutch stars Emily Scholtens and Adelinde Cornelissen more recently.

Vargas, age 69, describes himself as “probably the oldest athlete competing for Chile at the Pan American Games but I’m so proud to be here!” In partnership with Grimm he spends half of each year in Chile and the rest in Europe competing with young horses they have produced between them.

“I have made eight Grand Prix horses in my life and 32 Small Tour horses - producing good horses is my real passion. Svenja and I work together a long time and we do a good job I think!”, he pointed out.

He will be second into the arena with Kadeine when the Prix St Georges gets things underway tomorrow morning, following Colombian pathfinders Santiago Cardona and his nine-year-old stallion Dostojewski who will step into the ring at 11.00 local time. 

It’s going to be a roller-coaster two weeks of thrilling sport in all three equestrian Olympic disciplines, so don’t miss a hoofbeat….

Follow the action on FEI.TV

More about the equestrian events at the Pan American Games 2023 in Santiago (CHI) here 

Startlists and Results here