August 22, 2006

World Equestrian Games Journals from Aachen
Mack's Musings
By Father Mack (a.k.a.: Father Larry David McCormick)

“Advice My Father Gave Me”
Special to Dressage Daily #6

When I was just a kid (by comparison with my present grey-haired condition, that is) and was FINALLY going to be out from under foot in the McCormick household (read: I was heading off to university) there wasn’t room in the automobile my parents owned (it was a Chevy II, for the benefit of my fellow dinosaurs who will remember it) for Mom, Pop, and my corpulent self to fit in. Especially not with all the things one thinks he needs as he launches upon the waters of higher education.

Since Pop never drove in the entirety of his life, it was he who had to stay home. The night before we packed the car Pop and I sat down in the living room of the family home there in South Saint Louis so he could offer me a few bits of advice to assist me while I was away from home. One of those pieces of sage wisdom popped into my head as I watched Guenter Seidel and his team mate, Aragon, conclude their ride just a few minutes ago: “Don’t volunteer information.”

I will readily admit that it is nowhere near a perfect analogy for the lone major fault in Guenter’s and Aragon’s ride . . . they provided the judges and the rest of us in the audience with a view of seventeen flying changes down the length of the arena instead of the FEI expected fifteen. In effect they “volunteered information.” In spite of the “mistake,” this U.S. sportsman and sportshorse stand fourth in the ranking with only eight riders yet to go today.

At the press conference in an hour or two I expect that Guenter will provide an explanation of how this occurred (unless, of course, Aragon pokes his head into the media centre and wants to contribute his two cents’ worth). Until we hear Guenter’s side of the story (I will try as hard as I can to pry a word or two out of Aragon . . . a bribe of tasty carrots sometimes works) I would like to think that good old Aragon was just having so much fun showing us the length of his magnificent stride and was literally flying high as the horse equivalent of endorphins coursed through his blood stream.

Now, if only these two partners can come an agreement about how much they need to “volunteer” in the Special scheduled for Saturday (assuming, that is, that their score is not superceded by the horses and riders who follow today and tomorrow [Wednesday, the 23rd]) we will all have a sight to behold. Thanks for the advice, Pop!