0_Wizard
I ride horses competitively sometimes, it's also known as dressage.
They are also used in competitive sports including, but not limited to, dressage, endurance riding, eventing, reining, show jumping, tent pegging, vaulting, polo, horse racing, driving and rodeo (See additional equestrian sports listed later in this article for more examples).
chosen_Equestrianism_0
Equestrianism
chosen_topic_0_Equestrianism
Eventing
Eventing (also known as three day eventing or horse trials) is an equestrian event where a single horse and rider combination compete against other combinations across the three disciplines of dressage, cross-country, and show jumping. This event has its roots in a comprehensive cavalry test which required mastery of several types of riding. The competition may be run as a one-day event (ODE), where all three events are completed in one day (dressage, followed by cross country and then stadium) or a three-day event (3DE), which is more commonly now run over four days, with dressage on the first two days followed by cross country the next day and then show jumping in reverse order on the final day.
English saddle
English saddles are used to ride horses in English riding disciplines throughout the world. The discipline is not limited to England, the United Kingdom in general or other English-speaking countries. This style of saddle is used in all of the Olympic and International Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI) equestrian disciplines, except for the newly approved FEI events of equestrian vaulting and reining. Most designs were specifically developed to allow the horse freedom of movement, whether jumping, running, or moving quickly across rugged, broken country with fences. Unlike the western saddle or Australian Stock Saddle, there is no horn or other design elements that stick out above the main tree of the saddle.
Dressage
Dressage ( or ; a French term, most commonly translated to mean "training") is a highly skilled form of riding performed in exhibition and competition, as well as an "art" sometimes pursued solely for the sake of mastery. As an equestrian sport defined by the International Equestrian Federation, dressage is "the highest expression of horse training" where "horse and rider are expected to perform from memory a series of predetermined movements." Competitions are held at all levels from amateur to the Olympic Games and World Equestrian Games. Its fundamental purpose is to develop, through standardized progressive training methods, a horse's natural athletic ability and willingness to perform, thereby maximizing its potential as a riding horse.
Horses in warfare
The first use of horses in warfare occurred over 5,000 years ago. The earliest evidence of horses ridden in warfare dates from Eurasia between 4000 and 3000 BC. A Sumerian illustration of warfare from 2500 BC depicts some type of equine pulling wagons. By 1600 BC, improved harness and chariot designs made chariot warfare common throughout the Ancient Near East, and the earliest written training manual for war horses was a guide for training chariot horses written about 1350 BC. As formal cavalry tactics replaced the chariot, so did new training methods, and by 360 BC, the Greek cavalry officer Xenophon had written an extensive treatise on horsemanship.
Equestrianism
Equestrianism (from Latin equester, equestr-, equus, "horseman", "horse"), more often known as riding, horse riding (British English) or horseback riding (American English), refers to the skill of riding, driving, steeplechasing or vaulting with horses. This broad description includes the use of horses for practical working purposes, transportation, recreational activities, artistic or cultural exercises and competitive sport. Horses are trained and ridden for practical working purposes such as in police work or for controlling herd animals on a ranch. They are also used in competitive sports including, but not limited to, dressage, endurance riding, eventing, reining, show jumping, tent pegging, vaulting, polo, horse racing, driving and rodeo (See additional equestrian sports listed later in this article for more examples).
Cowboy
A cowboy is an animal herder who tends cattle on ranches in North America, traditionally on horseback, and often performs a multitude of other ranch-related tasks. The historic American cowboy of the late 19th century arose from the "vaquero" traditions of northern Mexico and became a figure of special significance and legend. A subtype, called a wrangler, specifically tends the horses used to work cattle. In addition to ranch work, some cowboys work for or participate in rodeos. Cowgirls, first defined as such in the late 19th century, had a less-well documented historical role, but in the modern world have established the ability to work at virtually identical tasks and obtained considerable respect for their achievements.
Horse
The horse ("Equus ferus caballus") is one of two extant subspecies of "Equus ferus". It is an odd-toed ungulate mammal belonging to the taxonomic family Equidae. The horse has evolved over the past 45 to 55 million years from a small multi-toed creature, "Eohippus", into the large, single-toed animal of today. Humans began to domesticate horses around 4000 BC, and their domestication is believed to have been widespread by 3000 BC. Horses in the subspecies "caballus" are domesticated, although some domesticated populations live in the wild as feral horses. These feral populations are not true wild horses, as this term is used to describe horses that have never been domesticated, such as the endangered Przewalski's horse, a separate subspecies, and the only remaining true wild horse.
1_Apprentice
That is very cool. It looks very fun.
0_Wizard
It's considered a very honorable and prestigious sport, also known as the highest expression of horse training.
As an equestrian sport defined by the International Equestrian Federation, dressage is "the highest expression of horse training" where "horse and rider are expected to perform from memory a series of predetermined movements."
self_Dressage_1
Dressage
self_2_Dressage
Dressage
Dressage ( or ; a French term, most commonly translated to mean "training") is a highly skilled form of riding performed in exhibition and competition, as well as an "art" sometimes pursued solely for the sake of mastery. As an equestrian sport defined by the International Equestrian Federation, dressage is "the highest expression of horse training" where "horse and rider are expected to perform from memory a series of predetermined movements." Competitions are held at all levels from amateur to the Olympic Games and World Equestrian Games. Its fundamental purpose is to develop, through standardized progressive training methods, a horse's natural athletic ability and willingness to perform, thereby maximizing its potential as a riding horse.
Horse training
Horse training refers to a variety of practices that teach horses to perform certain behaviors when asked to do so by humans. Horses are trained to be manageable by humans for everyday care as well as for equestrian activities from horse racing to therapeutic horseback riding for people with disabilities. Historically, horses were trained for warfare, farm work, sport and transport. Today, most horse training is geared toward making horses useful for a variety of recreational and sporting equestrian pursuits. Horses are also trained for specialized jobs from movie stunt work to police and crowd control activities, circus entertainment, and equine-assisted psychotherapy.
Horse behavior
Horse Behaviour has been studied by horse users for centuries, as the horse was one of the first animals mankind domesticated and understanding its behaviour has always been important in horse welfare and in training to get the best use out of a horse. In the wild, horses are prey animals that live in herds, which affects their reactions to other horses and to the world around them. Their behaviour in wild, feral conditions has been studied extensively as has their reactions to living and working in domestic situations. Interactions with other horses, such as dominance and communication methods has been studied extensively and numerous books and videos exist on different aspects of horse behaviour.
Horse trainer
A horse trainer is a person who tends to horses and teaches them different disciplines. Some of the responsibilities trainers have are caring for the animals’ physical needs, as well as teaching them submissive behaviors and/or coaching them for events, which may include contests and other riding purposes. The level of education and the yearly salary they can earn for this profession may differ depending on where the person is employed. Horse domestication by the Botai culture in Kazakhstan dates to about 3500 BC. Written records of horse training as a pursuit has been documented as early as 1350 BC, by Kikkuli, the Hurrian "master horse trainer" of the Hittite Empire.
Natural horsemanship
Natural horsemanship is a collective term for a variety of horse training techniques which have seen rapid growth in popularity since the 1980s. The techniques vary in their precise tenets but generally share principles of developing a rapport with horses, using methods said to be derived from observation of the natural behavior of free-roaming horses and rejecting abusive training methods. Natural horsemanship practitioners often describe their principles with evangelical zeal, describing the approach as being a radical departure from "traditional" techniques, which are often portrayed as being based in the use of unnecessary force.
John Gosden
John Harry Martin Gosden (born 30 March 1951) is a British racehorse trainer. He has trained over 3,000 winners worldwide, including winners of the Breeders' Cup Classic, the Derby, the Arc, the King George,the Eclipse, and over 600 winners in the United States. Gosden has trained the winners of over 100 Group 1 races in the United States, Europe, the Middle East and Asia. He is generally considered one of the finest and most successful racehorse trainers of his generation. His reputation for honesty and openness has led him to be called “one of the sport’s great communicators”. He is the only trainer in history whose horses have won the Cartier Awards for Cartier Champion Three-year-old Colt, Cartier Champion Three-year-old Filly and Cartier Horse of the Year in the same year.
Jesse Beery
Professor Jesse Beery (June 13, 1861 – February, 1945) was an American horse trainer and writer. He claimed he could train any horse, horses that ran away, horses that pulled too hard, horses that were spooked too easily and horses that refused to be shoed. His best-known work was "Prof. Beery's Mail Course in Horsemanship," and sold widely through mail-order ads placed in various equine magazines. His horse training methods are claimed to have been used by horse trainers all over the world over the last hundred years. Jesse Beery was the son of Enoch and Mary Beery. The Beery family, with its eight members, resided in Pleasant Hill, Ohio.
1_Apprentice
I did not know that. How long have people been riding competitively? 
0_Wizard
I'm not sure exactly, but I think the history is long. It's even a sport at the Olympics and World Equestrian Games.
Competitions are held at all levels from amateur to the Olympic Games and World Equestrian Games.
self_Dressage_2
Dressage
self_0_Dressage
Anky van Grunsven
Theodora Elisabeth Gerarda "Anky" van Grunsven (born 2 January 1968) is a Dutch dressage champion who is the only rider to record three successive Olympic wins in the same event. Along with her Olympic successes, she has won numerous medals at the World Equestrian Games (WEG), and is the only rider to have competed at every WEG since they began in 1990. Between 1990 and 2006, she competed at the Games in dressage, but in 2010 she was named as part of the Dutch reining team, marking a major change in discipline. In addition to her Olympic and World Equestrian Games successes, van Grunsven holds the record for the most wins at the Dressage World Cup, winning the event nine times between 1995 and 2008.
David O'Connor (equestrian)
David John O'Connor (born January 18, 1962) is a retired equestrian who represented the United States in the sport of three-day eventing. He competed in two Olympic Games, winning a team silver at the 1996 Summer Olympics and an individual gold and team bronze at the 2000 Summer Olympics. At the 1999 Pan American Games, O'Connor took an individual silver and team gold and at the 2002 World Equestrian Games he assisted the US team to gold. After his retirement from competition in 2004, he became involved in the administrative side of international eventing. O'Connor has held top coaching roles for the US and Canadian national eventing teams, and was president of the United States Equestrian Federation from 2004 to 2012.
Para-equestrian classification
Para-equestrian classification is a system for para-equestrian sport is a graded system based on the degree of physical or visual disability and handled at the international level by the FEI. The sport has eligible classifications for people with physical and vision disabilities. Groups of eligible riders include The sport is open to competitors with impaired muscle power, athetosis, impaired passive range of movement, hypertonia, limb deficiency, ataxia, leg length difference, short stature, and vision impairment. They are grouped into five different classes to allow fair competition. These classes are Grade Ia, Grade Ib, Grade II, Grade III, and Grade IV.
Ulla Salzgeber
Ulla Salzgeber (born 5 August 1958 in Oberhausen) is a German equestrian and Olympic champion who competes in the sport of dressage. Competing in the 2000 and 2004 Summer Olympics, she won two team gold medals, one individual silver and one individual bronze. She also won numerous medals at the World Equestrian Games, Dressage World Cup and European Dressage Championships. After the retirement of her Olympic horse, Rusty, after the 2004 Games, and unexpected death of her second international-level mount in 2005, Salzgeber struggled to find a new Grand Prix-level horse. In 2005, she took time from competition to act as the dressage training adviser to the Australian national equestrian team, but resigned from that position in late 2006.
Steffen Peters
Steffen Peters (born September 18, 1964) is a German-born equestrian who competes for the United States in dressage. He has participated in four Olympic Games, winning a team bronze medal on two occasions (in 1996 and 2016). Peters has been successful in numerous other international competitions, including winning team bronze at the 2006 World Equestrian Games, two individual bronze medals at the 2010 World Equestrian Games and individual and team gold medals at both 2011 and 2015 Pan Am Games. The horse upon which he won many of his titles, Ravel, was retired in 2012. After 2012, his international successes came on Legolas.
Karen O'Connor
Karen Lende O'Connor (born February 17, 1958) is an American equestrian who competes in three day eventing. Although she did not come from a family of equestrians, her interest in horses started at an early age, and she received her first horse for her 11th birthday. O'Connor began competing internationally in the late 1970s, and in 1986 began riding for the US national eventing team. Since then, she had ridden in five Olympic Games, three World Equestrian Games and two Pan-American Games, winning multiple medals, including a team silver at the 1996 Olympic Games and a team bronze at the 2000 Olympic Games.
Ready Teddy (horse)
Ready Teddy (1987 – 23 April 2011) was an eventing horse competitively ridden by New Zealand equestrian Blyth Tait. Together the pair competed in three Olympics, winning gold at the 1996 Summer Games, and took two golds at the 1998 World Equestrian Games. He was the first eventing horse to win individual gold at both an Olympic Games and a World Equestrian Games. Ready Teddy died from colic in 2011. Ready Teddy was a chestnut Thoroughbred gelding foaled in 1987, sired by Brilliant Invader. As a young horse he was named Striking Back and competed in Thoroughbred racing. Blyth Tait's father found him at a Pony Club event and had him shipped to England in 1994, as an eventing prospect for his son.