IN THIS ISSUE OF START BOX

• Welcome Message: Piloting new initiatives for our members in 2024!
• Ontario's U25 Program: NAYC Team Announcement and Fundraiser
• Riding with Olympians!
• Schooling Days are on the Schedule
• It's a Wrap on the Rebecca Howard Clinic
• Website Update
• 2024 ONTARIO HORSE TRIALS CALENDAR

Piloting Initiatives for our Members in 2024!

The OEA is pleased to share three new initiatives in the lineup for the 2024 season designed to add to what we do to encourage all our members – Juniors, Adult Riders, and Coaches – to support and strengthen sanctioned Eventing in Ontario. These initiatives will run as pilot projects in 2024. They are all now getting off the ground, if not off the ground already, and, where registration is required, are open for registration.

1.  Zara’s Legacy of Excellence

This initiative is directed towards our wonderful Junior members. Our Juniors are an enormously important cohort making up over one-third of the OEA’s membership and representing the future of Eventing in Ontario. The OEA and the Zara Buren Memorial Foundation are delighted to announce a pilot project in 2024 that recognizes and celebrates Ontario’s most successful Junior eventers: Zara’s Legacy of Excellence.

This initiative builds on our existing collaboration with the Zara Buren Memorial Foundation and the Buren/Haque Family, who already sponsor the annual Zara Buren Memorial Award. Since 2021, that Award has provided grants to 23 competitive Junior members to assist with travel, training, schooling and competition costs. The OEA is extremely grateful for the opportunities that it has offered to some of our most talented and hard-working Juniors, and we are very happy to continue this collaboration through the Zara’s Legacy of Excellence initiative to benefit and inspire even more young eventers. Zara’s Legacy of Excellence recognizes and rewards the top Junior (based on a coefficient calculation) at each sanctioned Ontario Horse Trial and furnishes year-end ribbons and prizes.

Zara’s Legacy of Excellence was launched at Cherrylane Horse Trials 1 on June 15 where the top-placed Junior was: Nicola MacLeod riding Flash of Brilliance at EV90 with a final score of 27.08*. Congratulations! Retroactive congratulations and saddle pads go to Alexandra Wickett / Philanthropy (EV100 / 31.2) for her success at Glen Oro’s Spring Horse Trials and Daria Risk / All That (EV85 / 21.4) for earning the top score among Juniors at Grandview’s Spring Horse Trials. Congratulations to you all for representing the sport of Eventing with such proficiency and for being such wonderful role models. Click here for more information.

2.  The OEA Adult Rider Team Challenge

This second initiative is put in place to thank our Adult Riders who are an indispensable cohort of our membership and show up week-in-and-week-out throughout the season to compete at sanctioned Horse Trials in Ontario. We’d like to encourage camaraderie and celebrate team-building and community across this important group of members including helping strengthen a sense of shared experience among riders who might ride, school, and event on their own. Members are encouraged to register in teams or as individuals. Teams may be made up of three or four riders and team members can ride at different levels and out of different locations across the province. We live and ride in a large and disparate province and, for riders seeking community, we hope that this will help bring our body of committed adult eventers closer together.

​OEA Adult members (over 18) are eligible for to participate in this Team Challenge. Teams must register with the OEA before they can start collecting points. Individuals are invited to register and the OEA will do its best to place individual registrants on an existing team or on a team with other individuals. During the pilot phase, registration is open until 15 August 2024 and results will be applied retroactively to the beginning of the season. The ‘Adult Riders Team Challenge’ Leaderboard will be maintained by an OEA volunteer associated with the Schooling Days and Adult Riders Committee. Click here for more information.

3.  The OEA Coach of the Year Award

To all the coaches who work long hours preparing for, and taking their students to, sanctioned Horse Trials in Ontario – this one’s for you! Each year, the OEA will award a year-end prize to an Ontario coach based on the greatest accumulation of Regular OEA Leaderboard points earned by the riders who train with them. This Award is a token of sincere thanks from the OEA for all the hard-working coaches who keep our sport healthy in Ontario. We wouldn’t be here without you!

The Award will be announced at the OEA’s Annual General Meeting in November and the winner – the licensed coach whose students have earned the most leaderboard points at sanctioned Horse Trials in Ontario at the end of the season – will receive a branded ‘OEA Coach of the Year’ ‘golf’ jacket and a $250 cash prize. To be eligible, coaches must be licensed and are asked to please register with us a list of students they coach regularly at EC-sanctioned Horse Trials so that we don’t miss anyone. We’ll do the rest.

During this pilot phase registration is open until 15 August 2024, results will be applied retroactively to the beginning of the season and all divisions will be weighted equally.

The ‘Coach-of-the-Year’ Leaderboard will be maintained by an OEA volunteer associated with the Coaching & Education Committee. Click here for more information.

We're looking forward to seeing how these three initiatives unfold. The 2024-25 off-season will provide us with a chance to consult our members, to evaluate the implementation of the projects, and to make any adjustments for 2025. Participation is free for OEA members.

-- Sarah

President, OEA

#ontarioeventing

#rideforzara

#zaraburenmemorialfoundation

#zaraslegacyofexcellence

#letsgoeventing



YOUR OEA BOARD OF DIRECTORS

Executive Committee

President - Sarah Richardson (president@ontarioeventing.ca)

Vice-President - Doug Topalovic (vp@ontarioeventing.ca)

Treasurer - Bernadette Johnston (finances@ontarioeventing.ca)

Secretary - Tori Pengelly (secretary@ontarioeventing.ca)

Chair - Veronica Low          

Director-at-large - Nicole Maclellan

Directors

Jamie Kellock

Kaileen Millard-Ruff

Samantha Pritchard

Stephanie Shatilla

Xavier Traisnel

Gabrielle Turcotte

Hot off the Press: Ontario's Teams for the NAYC Championships are announced!

The following rider and horse combinations have been selected by the OEA and our selectors to represent Ontario in Maryland this July:

CCI 1 *

• Olivia MacLeod and Watch Me Skip Away
• Alexandra Wickett and Philanthropy
• Alexa Maclaren and Allemande
• Avery Tallman and BDE Olympic Royale
• Avery Tallman and Rehy Investor (Avery will ride one horse as an individual and one horse on the CCI 1* Team)

CCI 2*

• Saffron Klotz and Ballingowen Clarity
• Chelsea Lowe and Fernhill Mailto Park

CCI 3*

• Megane Sauve and Nuance 

Congratulations to all the selected riders! We had the most riders qualify this year since the program was re-launched in 2019. We want to send out a heartfelt thank you to our selectors, our riders, parents, grooms, coaches, and organizers. It takes a village and we could not develop our future talent squad without your support!

The Young Riders are hosting a garden party and silent auction to support their journey to the Young Rider Championships in Maryland this July. Join us for an afternoon of good food, drinks, music, and a chance to bid on some fantastic items in our silent auction! Come support your local young riders and enjoy a fun time with our community. If you can't make it to the garden party, buying a ticket or donating an item for the silent auction is a great way to show your support. Every bit of help makes a big difference for these dedicated athletes

U25 Garden Party Fundraiser - Link to Full Invite Here!

Saturday, June 22 - 2 - 5 pm,

116 Hazel Ridge Court, Kleinburg, Ontario, L0J 1C0

Riding with the Olympians!

This is for all riders entering an EC-sanctioned Horse Trials in Ontario on Sunday, July 28 – in the East at Stevens Creek Farm and the West at Glenarden Farms.

And it's for anyone else who would like to come for a fun day, joining patriotic eventers to celebrate Canada's efforts in Paris in the early morning hours of July 28.

The OEA and your two Organizers invite you to create a winning XC outfit, in red and white, to show your support for Canada’s Olympic team riding their XC on Sunday, July 28^th at Versailles.

Prizes will be offered to the horse and rider sporting the best XC outfit and to a runner-up horse/rider combination. Judges will be determined by the Organizers at each location.

OEA Schooling Days are on the Schedule!

We’ve scheduled two OEA Schooling Days in 2024

• All OEA Schooling Days are $65.00 per horse/rider combination
• No OEA membership is required to take part in a Schooling Day.
• Non eventers welcome!
• Current Ontario Equestrian (OE) membership is required.

Thursday, July 4 - OEA Cross-Country Schooling Day at Bronte Creek Equestrian with clinician Judith Bisiker

 ** Entries opened on May 30 and will close on June 27 **

Sign up at https://www.competeeasy.com/Equest/Event.aspx

Wednesday, August 14 - OEA Cross-Country Schooling Day at Stevens Creek Farm with clinicians Teddie Laframboise and Moira de Ste. Croix

** Entries open on July 1 and will close on August 6

If you have any questions, please contact Kaileen Millard-Ruff for help or to be put on a waiting list (Kaileen@bell.net). 

Click here for more information.

It's a Wrap on the Rebecca Howard Clinic

On June 2 and 3, the OEA organized a clinic with Canadian Eventing Team Chef

d’Equipe, Rebecca Howard. Day one featured cross-country, held on the beautiful courses at Glen Oro Farm. Day 2, saw stadium jumping at Ten Sixty Stables which provided a great facility with lots of space for equipment, jump exercises, and a full stadium course. The clinic was a huge success and we are already looking forward to the next one.

We appreciate everyone who came out over the two-day clinic. The riders, auditors, volunteers, and OEA board members joined to put together a great weekend. Not only was it a superb learning opportunity it also provided an opportunity for some rewarding community building.

Thank you to Rebecca for making the effort to spend time with our OEA members. It was a fantastic opportunity for everyone to learn from a world-class rider and coach.

The feedback has been super, starting with how generous she was with her time and her knowledge. She answered all the riders’ questions in-depth and she tailored her instructions to each horse/rider combination optimizing their time on the course and in the ring.

To our Horse-Trial Organizer, Leslie Saila, we are grateful for the care and hospitality offered by Glen Oro Farms. The jumps were flagged, and ditches, banks, and water complexes mowed, the horses and riders were treated to some interesting questions, and, along with the auditors, all were warmly welcomed.

At the end of both days, everyone left happy and educated. We wish Rebecca a wonderful summer as Chef d ’Equipe of the Canadian Eventing Team and hope to have her back again soon. 

Website Update

Redesigning the website has been a huge job and we're running a little behind our original May launch date. Stay with us....we expect to be ready to launch in July.

Watch this space for updates soon!

Not sure what memberships you need to compete this year? Check out the article on our website that explains all the memberships: https://ontarioeventing.com/memberships/

Exciting news! We are once again waiving the OEA Day Membership fee for the EV60 level to encourage riders to give eventing a try! Don't forget, EV60 riders taking advantage of this need to purchase a membership before the end of the season to be eligible for year-end awards; all your results will be included.