Toronto is a historical show and it’s always fun to participate in this type of classical and traditional shows. I arrived early on Wednesday morning, while it was snowing, with Argan de Beliard and Fasther.  

The stables for the FEI horses are inside a big building where all horses are mixed together; you can find ponies, carriage horses, young horses, dressage horses, the diversity of equine culture is there for sure!  

To get settled from the truck to the stable we are using a cart dragged by tractors. They bring our equipment up the ramp since the FEI barn area is on the second floor of the building. The FEI area is in one corner and away from visitors – which is a must and a plus for our horses.

The practice ring is in the middle of the stabling area and allows us to ride the horses inside the facilities without disturbing the competition ongoing in the main ring. Since there is competition all day, we have a specific schedule with certain times for riding during the day.

The days are long at the Royal Horse Show, which also allows us to go and visit the fair. You can go visit the shops, see the farm animals and the breeding competition, try some really good food (the Rostis potato were probably my favourite), talk to breeders and farmers and much more.

The competitions for the FEI jumpers are mostly during the evening session around 9PM. The ring is usually packed for the Big Ben Grand Prix and the World Cup competition, which is great because it motivates us at those really late hours.

During the competition we have the priority in the stable ring for the warm up and also there is, next to the show ring, a tiny ring for last fence jump. The roof is so low that we were hoping our riders won’t touch it…

Last year, we had a horse that participated in the K-9 class which was really fun, it’s a relay between horses and dogs. One dog would do a agility course in the middle of the ring and as soon as the dog is done, the horse jumps a course and the time and penalties combined makes the leader board. Always fun to have variety of classes!

Fun fact; On Friday, we have no access to the ring as it is “cow day” so the main ring is closed during the cow competition, which is also really interesting to watch, and something different.

The Royal always brings a lot of people together and sets the first Christmas vibe, the national stall set ups are beautiful, and full of Christmas decorations.  I was also able to go and see the carriage horses, 2-3-4 but also 6 of them, which is pretty impressive I have to say when the horses’ hoofs are at least three times bigger than our horses’!

While Toronto gave us a first hint of Christmas, we are next off to Geneva!

- Corentin -