that was the best freestyle ride i have ever seen. ever.
i was crying and laughing and chills up and down my spine.
he should of won. and the crowd knew it!
Fuego was fantastic. There were many nice rides otherwise, too! The judging was MORE than disappointing (and not just in Fuego’s case, though it was the most blatant). I left feeling that I’m just through caring about straight dressage; next time I’ll spend my money on more eventing phases and enjoy myself a lot more.
I watched it on FEI TV. Fuego and Juan were incredible! Their performance brought me to tears.
I’ve seen a lot of incredible things in my life
but watching Fuego’s freestyle from 3rd row center was the most amazing thing I’ve ever seen. His coat looked like hot silver silk, and he and his rider were just electric. And I’m not sure how hard it is to do one handed one tempis, but I’m pretty sure the others will go home and try it in the privacy of their own arenas!
The crowd started when they entered the ring and the cheering just got to the point where people were cheering when they should throughout the entire ride.
Everyone was on their feet as soon as he halted and when he raised his hat in triumph and his horse shot forward, as he was regaining his balance (no small feat), he was laughing with joy.
Totilas’ reception was rather flat based on his messiah factor and while his test might have been technically more difficult, he was vastly overscored, he had a couple of major bobbles.
The judging had been pretty fair until last night, and we didn’t just boo the low score for Fuego, we boo’d all of them ,and largely, people weren’t too pleased with how high Toto scored.
Edward had to be in warmup wondering what the hell was going on in the arena.
He got the medal, but Fuego is the one everyone will be talking about.
[QUOTE=Petstorejunkie;5132877]
I was there. Fuego brought me to tears it was that beautiful. I personally think his ride was better than Totilas.
It was a religious experience to witness him.
The judging was so political I had to do a double take and make sure I wasn’t at a hunter show.[/QUOTE]
Absolutely.
The test was so much fun to watch. The horse had so much energy and IMPULSION. The current trend in dressage is to throttle the horse down too much.
[QUOTE=Kementari;5132993]
Fuego was fantastic. There were many nice rides otherwise, too! The judging was MORE than disappointing (and not just in Fuego’s case, though it was the most blatant). I left feeling that I’m just through caring about straight dressage; next time I’ll spend my money on more eventing phases and enjoy myself a lot more.[/QUOTE]
The cynic in me is thinking that a win by an Andalusian wouldn’t be considered good for the warmblood industry…
Maybe some are not so educated but guys the spanish rider ended up in the right spot…I appreciate he was a crowd pleaser I enjoyed him last night but come on no way a medal winning performance. :eek:
I hope the rider feels as good as we all do about it.
It must be so hard to put in all that time and effort and pretty much know that no matter is you SHOULD get a 100% that they’ll make sure you don’t beat x, y, or z…
There are always people/animals who peak when “better” people/animals peak (Affirmed/Alydar), but at least in the racing, no one was saying "oh, we’ll just take some time off Affirmed’s run to make sure he wins.
I was somewhat pollyanna about dressage until I attended the World Cup in 2004. (And yes, I was a huge Brettina fan, but didn’t put her first necessarily, I think Gal was robbed there…brettina, well, very different styles to compare and I would see how Gal would have won). And then what I saw of Olympic coverage just perpetuated it. It’s fixed within a group.
His ride was so much fun! Loved how pumped up the crowd got and it was satisfying to boo the judges. we’ve all wanted to do that one time or another;-)
[QUOTE=Equibrit;5133166]
Fuego freestyle; http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OXJpfYihRTs[/QUOTE]
Thank you for posting this - my three year old stopped watching his favorite cartoon to watch. 
It was a beautiful freestyle :yes:
[QUOTE=ridgeback;5133198]
Maybe some are not so educated but guys the spanish rider ended up in the right spot…I appreciate he was a crowd pleaser I enjoyed him last night but come on no way a medal winning performance. :eek:[/QUOTE]
Yes. Lots of little glitches put up a lower score when you add them all together.
All the Freestyle rides are here:
http://www.topdressage.tv/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=1920
And WHO was the judge at B?
[QUOTE=Elatu;5133411]
And WHO was the judge at B?[/QUOTE]
Maribel Alonso from Mexico
The judges can’t ignore that he’s moving wide behind in the piaffe, and trailing his hocks in the extended trot.
Adorable though
… i have to disagree with the majority here. After watching the link to juan and fuego (thank you for the link btw!!! :yes: one handed tempis were awwwwseome!!!) there’s no comparison.
juan was amazing, had all the movements but the test didnt flow, between movements was rough and jerking to my eye and altogether you can see juans riding, you can tell he’s up there moving his hands and seat for the movements. the rhythm is choppy and horse seems tense.
compare that to gals riding, where you dont see a rider move (yet the horse is doing each movement by almost invisible aids!) and how each transition flows into the next… i’ll compare the piaffe too… totilas has suspension, while fuego has piaffe but theres no suspension/bounce. And you can see how relaxed totilas is in the ring with a clear rhythm in all his gaits.
seems fairly judged to me…
I am the newbiest of newbs and can’t ride dressage out of a wet paper bag (but I am trying) it was a lovely test from a beautiful pair but I did see plenty of little small mistakes throughout. Didn’t see the other rides but a bunch of little points off all add up.
I am in awe of the ride, I could never even DREAM of doing that-- but there were errors throughout. As the beneficiary of a test riddled with errors myself (though at a waaaaaaaaaay lower level)-- they add up! And a cleaner but perhaps less dazzling test comes out ahead-- and that’s okay. I think the correctness of each movement has to count first with artistry second-- and there were enough mistakes throughout to think they added up. Were the medal winning tests also full of many small errors? And at the same level of difficulty?
Regardless-- gorgeous horse, lovely partnership and I can’t even imagine what that artistry AND an error-free test would be like. Incredible!
[QUOTE=mbm;5132989]
that was the best freestyle ride i have ever seen. ever.
i was crying and laughing and chills up and down my spine.
he should of won. and the crowd knew it![/QUOTE]
Ummm seriously?? Sorry it was nice and I stood up more for his showmanship but if you really know what you’re looking at you would never say he should have won. I see splitting hairs with Steffan and Imke but this NO way.
[QUOTE=ridgeback;5133492]
Ummm seriously?? Sorry it was nice and I stood up more for his showmanship but if you really know what you’re looking at you would never say he should have won. I see splitting hairs with Steffan and Imke but this NO way.[/QUOTE]
I think we are on the same line about his performance. I will do my translation of my opinion later 
maybe because i feel his work is more “correct” (since when are piaffes supposed to bounce?), and while he is tense in the neck, so are many others… (his faster tempo is his breed)
also, i wanted to say i loved Laura’s ride… she did a superb job. but the tension in the other top horses was just distracting - helicopter tails just dont do it for me.
if we had top rides that were like Alfs and Fuego’s i think you would see a much more content dressage world.
and, i think it would be super interesting to do a split vid of Totilas and Fuego in the GP or special to be able to compare side by side.
no matter how hard i try i cant like Totilas in the show arena. it just looks wrong to me - altho i do like some of his warmups. and i do not like his music at all.
ah well forever the contrarian - guess i cant change at this late stage!
