In my previous diary I was lambasting NBC for their draggy video feed on the first day. I watched a small amount of event dressage and the feed bogged up on me. Day 2 was perfect. I watched every damn horse.
Day 3 was Cross Country and the course was brilliant. Over and above that, the camera work was better than any I've ever seen. I watched all of it, all six hours worth. Brilliant. No lag, very little out of sync and an OK Brit doing the commentary although neither he, nor the graphics indicated who he was.
Tina Cook of Great Britain on Miners Frolic had a flawless run under the 10 minutes 3 seconds allowed. Cook put Britain back on top of the team leader board until the Germans edged ahead again. I was rooting for Miners Frolic because he is a Thoroughbred and because I feel the Germans got too high marks in the Dressage portion. A lot of Warmbloods, which all of the rest are but I think 3, were visibly tired and heaving. Not a few went down. Zara Phillips, the Queen's granddaughter made it through to tie at tenth with Christopher Burton of Australia. Mary King also of GB is in 6th place after a brilliant but somewhat ugly ride of which she looked to be only the passenger on a heady Imperial Cavalier who ran the course himself, fast.
All of the jumps were spectacular. The crescent moon high atop a hill with London Skyscrapers is the most picturesque though. The course runs through the park, over paved streets, back through the stadium at the halfway point, down hills, up hills, through 2 water features and under trees.
Not a boring minute. You can keep all the other sports. The difference between Event Dressage and Dressage will be apparent when you watch the Dressage portion of Eventing and then see these hot, fit horses gallop a 5728 meter course [over 3.5 miles] in 10 minutes. Now I await the stadium jumping portion. I'll watch regular old dressage too, but nothing beats an Event horse and I am rooting for the TB.