Equine Bridge Program Across the Disciplines Relaunched to Boost British Breeding

Breeding

Great Britain

British Breeding announced the re-launch of the newly enhanced British Breeding Equine Bridge, in association with British Show jumping, British Dressage and British Eventing.

The Equine Bridge is a programme designed to bring together breeders, trainers, riders and owners to support the very best British bred horses on their journey into the sport and to achieve the ultimate goal of seeing more British riders on British horses representing their country at international level.

The first new Equine Bridge event will take place on 14th and 15th October this year at Addington EC in Buckinghamshire and is for horses and ponies aged four to six years that have qualified via the British Breeding Baileys Horse Feeds Futurity Evaluations.

The October Equine Bridge event will offer activities for ridden four to six-year-old horses and ponies for the disciplines of eventing, dressage, show jumping and endurance. The event is designed to encourage networking between breeders, trainers and riders to and encourage investors and new owners into the market by offering information and seminars on management, insurance and syndicate opportunities, plus a showcasing opportunity for unridden horses and ponies at three to four years of age.

The ridden Bridge horses will undergo a two day evaluation program designed to provide helpful support and feedback, as well as an objective and detailed assessment. It will include a detailed veterinary inspection of correctness of conformation and soundness and nutritional, saddlery and farriery advice from industry experts. The horses and ponies will be observed by a team of three internationally renowned judges over both days. On day 1, the participants will receive training under their usual rider with senior discipline trainers, then on day 2, the horses will be presented again under saddle, first with their own rider, and then with one of the disciplines’ test riders who will contribute to the feedback.

As well as recognition for having completed the Bridge assessment, British Breeding and the Olympic Disciplines are working together to provide an attractive range of benefits, from reductions on membership and entry fees, to access to further opportunities designed to offer incentives and support.

CEO of British Dressage, Jason Brautigam, says, “Our vision for the Equine Bridge is to create an ongoing programme of support and opportunities. The October event is an important start to a range of activities designed to get the very best British bred horses out there representing their country. We will continue to monitor the progress of all Bridge candidates and offer incentives and support where it is needed. We are particularly interested in ways in which we can provide better information about and accessibility to young horse classes, at national level, as well as for the world breeding championships.”

Recruitment to the Equine Bridge takes place via the British Breeding Futurity programme. From the pool of past Futurity entries, those who achieved a score of 8.5 or above as 3-year-olds and who are aged between 4 and 6 this year are already qualified to go forward for the Bridge programme. Additional qualifying opportunities have also been implemented for this summer.

Three-year-old entrants are to be presented in hand and loose and will benefit from a new arena layout designed to eliminate tension and give youngstock a good experience. Five-year-old entrants will be presented under saddle to show some basic work appropriate for their age, as well as without tack for their conformation assessment. Four-year-old entrants will have a choice of being presented loose and in hand or under saddle.