Rosslyn Smith
American Thinker
6/19/2012
Ann Romney’s dressage horse Rafalca won a place on the 2012 US Olympic Team this weekend.
Rafalca, the 15-year-old Oldenburg mare co-owned by Mrs. Romney, won a spot on the Olympic dressage team, along with trainer Jan Ebeling. The U.S. Equestrian Federation made the official announcement naming the Olympic competitors over the weekend.
While our ever smarmy press keeps calling it “horse ballet” to make the Romney’s sound effete, the sport of dressage, like all the mounted equestrian events, actually has its roots in the bloody traditions of European mounted warfare. Before the horse was replaced by motorized vehicles in the mid 20th century many nation’s international equestrian teams consisted largely of military officers.
From the beginning knights needed to control their mounts with subtle shifts of leg pressure to keep hands free first for lance shield. The horses themselves needed to be conditioned into suppleness and trained to make flying lead changes, to turn smoothly on either front quarters or hand quarters and to travel laterally because these exercises assisted horse and rider in keeping their balance during the rapid changes of direction during a fight. A horse that moved in a well collected manner at a trot and canter also provided a smoother platform for a rider trying to take aim at an enemy with a pistol or to flail him with a saber…
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