In spite of the headlines being show jumping; this appears to be two International dressage horses.
I’m still left confused after reading this. Anyone able to make good sense of this registry in a different country? So many International horses have been imported to different countries. Not to mention riders with sponsors/owners in different countries. Not just dressage…
I’m confused by this.
In simple terms, the nationality of horse’s rider and the horse’s owner(s) must be the same.
https://inside.fei.org/content/tokyo2020-olympic-games-horse-ownershipnationality-reminder
Thank you!
The anchor Israeli showjumping rider is also out from not having his horse registered to an owner in Isreal, but instead the US.
The FEI said they sent multiple reminder emails to these people, but they never took action.
I mean, its the Olympics. Get your s* together and get your paperwork done!
Thank you.
It’s super confusing to me to see USA born and raised citizens competing on other countries teams. Same goes for horses I guess?
I would say at this level it’s pretty international, and I could totally see a person in one country like the USA with money to burn wanting to be owner of a horse competing at the highest levels, which in dressage would mean being based on Northern Europe.
As far as Israel, there are strong ties between some Americans and Israel. That doesn’t surprise me at all.
I expect that the ownership doesn’t matter at all until the Olympics are on the horizon, and that’s not something you necessarily anticipated 5 or 10 years ago when you started the arrangement.
As far as the human side, I know there was a Canadian dressage rider who just missed the Olympic team last time around and who then started riding under the flag of a smaller European country in Florida the following winter. I forget how she did this, maybe via her husbands nationality?
I don’t think any Canadian or American citizens are getting spots on the German, Netherlands, or British equestrian teams. The Germans have a very deep pool of talent. The FEI rankings are interesting reading. Top ranked in Canada or the USA is generally about world 100. If you didn’t make the Canadian or US team it could be a career move to take your ranking to a smaller country though ilm not sure that gets you to the Olympics necessarily.
The Olympics are the best of each country competing against each other. They are not the world top ranked riders competing against each other. For dressage, that’s going to be happening in Northern European CDI4* where you get the Germans and Dutch etc who dominate the FEI world top 20 fighting it out to pick the world top 4. Then they compete against the Canadian team which might be world 120.
Canada and the US qualify for the Olympics by competing in PanAm games against the underfunded developing countries of Central and South America. So unless they screw up and get disqualified for drugs there is always an Olympic slot.
The showjumper had said the US owner was actually him, it was a holding he made in a name he wanted (or something like that, obviously Im not versed in this lol). He said the company was actually just him, and so he should be given lee way. But the FEI said rules are rules. Sorry, no Olympics for you.
Wow. It seems a bit unfair that the Dutch horse is out due to the FEI’s error with the owner’s address. That seems quite different from the other two cases.
I remember some thing back in the day about requiring citizenship at the Olympics due in part to the high number of track and field competitors from Africa switching countries months before the Olympics when they lost a slot on their team but were better than the contenders from another country.
So the Olympic committee at the time created the rule that you had to be a citizen of that country.
Then, they tightened the rule that you could not switch citizenship more than once (I think), to alleviate people switching each Olympic trials as some countries would give citizenship to an athlete so that they had representation at the Olympics.
The rule that horse and rider must have same citizenship probably falls under that same concept - that the support is coming from the country they are representing.
I don’t really feel for these athletes. It shouldn’t take much to verify their nationality, especially now with internet access to everything. As the Olympics approach, they should verify. None of the athletes mentioned were randomly assigned a different nationality - all either had a horse from another country or were switching citizenship. Someone who chose to have his horse owned by a company he decided to base in the US even though he lives in Europe should know better.
If horses are owned by a corporation vs held by an individual; would the corporation need to have been formed in the same country as the rider? I think corporations can be licensed to operate in more than one county? Not sure how that really works as far as being eligible for horse country ownership?
This seems like a strange detail for so many to mess up for such an important ‘show’.
I completely understand the purpose of nationality rules for human athletes, but it’s less clear to me why the nationality of a horse’s owner should matter. The horse’s owner isn’t the one competing for their country.
Imagine how Aussies feel looking at the US Eventing team…
In some countries, having the prospect of qualifying a team (or even a single rider!) for the Olympics or WEG is a key driver for development activities. The focus would change if riders can just pack a suitcase, fly to Europe and be offered the ride on a fancy horse so its owner can get it in the Olympics. The current system isn’t perfect, but requiring people from the same country to invest in owning the horses prompts thinking about how to develop the sport’s future.
Moving to a smaller country seems to be what show-jumper Brittni Raflowitz did. In a couple of articles I read, she is described as an “American-born Israeli rider.” But on the FEI site, they call her an “American Show Jumping athlete.”
I understand she was very active in the US as a junior, finishing 2nd at the 2015 NAJYRC. She now lives in Israel and is on the Israeli Olympic Show Jumping Team. Maybe she has duel American/Israeli citizenship?
I’m a dressage person, so I only know about her from the reality show Jumping with Brittni. I do have to admit that I give her quite a bit of side-eye for stating (listed on FEI site) that the most influential person in her career was Barney Ward.
Just double-checked. Brittni is not on the Israeli Olympic team for Tokyo. In Oct 2019, she was announced as a member of the Israeli team, and she also qualified to be considered for the Olympics this year, but is not on the team.
Sorry for any misinformation. 
There is a fair amount of sham ownership in horses. A number of event horses running for NZ, Australia, Italy, even Ireland have British owners because their riders are UK based. Borough Pennyz riden for Italy by Vittoria Pannizon comes to mind because I always liked that horse, British bred and owned. I was once looking at a sponsorship deal and was told the rider would still really own the horse but my name would be listed as ‘owner’ if it made the Olympic team (both rider and I are British though).
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