For many riders it’s a massive manoeuvre – often they are away from home for several weeks, spend enormous amounts of time and money preparing for the trip and travel enormous distances over land and sea  - and they do it because they all love dressage.

Travelling to this year’s Saddleworld Championships are riders from Western Australia, the middle of Queensland and from Tasmania.

Philippa Cassidy and 7-year-old Voltaire, a.k.a. Hugo, are seasoned commuters on The Spirit of Tasmania.

“Hugo, who’s by Jaybee Alabaster, has competed at Dressage With The Stars in Melbourne in both the four and five year-old-classes,” she said from her home in East Launceston. “We then qualified for the six-year-olds but didn’t get there as we couldn’t get a berth on The Spirit.

“In Sydney we’ll be competing at Medium. The ship leaves the dock at about 7.30pm arriving in Melbourne at about six in the morning. We’ll stay with my coach, Brya Law in Kilmore for a week and then she’ll come with me on the trip to Sydney, which will take two days – we’ll stay at Tarcutta overnight.

“I’m an amateur rider and I’ll be away from home until November 4; my 7-year-old daughter’s not impressed, although she’ll visit us in Melbourne . “Professionally I’m a financial planner which is a bit unfortunate because I know what everything is costing me!”

But Philippa is looking forward to the SIEC experience. Hugo has been Novice, Elementary and Medium Horse of the Year in Tasmania and she is keen to see how he will go in Sydney.

Wendy Cumming from Cardup, WA will be catching up with her Advanced horse, Joshua Brook Jamison, a.k.a. ‘Chunky’, who’s already in Sydney. He came across the Nullarbor in a transport truck with horses competing in the recent Australian Interschool Championships.

“My youngest daughter, I have three children, was in these Championships where she did very well. She’s now gone back.

“Chunky was a bit dehydrated when he first arrived but all’s well now.
“He’s a Holsteiner by a W.A. stallion called Northern Keil,” explained Wendy, who is coached by Ramon Guerrero, a Queensland-based trainer formerly with El Caballo Blanco.

Since arriving in the east her horse has been at Diamond B Stud in Glossodia.
“I’ve been going through my tests in an indoor arena across the road and have entered an event at SIEC before the Nationals so Chunky can get used to competing inside.

“The indoor at Horsley Park is the most beautiful arena I’ve ever seen – it’s really lovely.”

Karen Spice, like Wendy, will see the SIEC arena for the very first time.
“I’ve never been to Sydney and neither has my horse,” she said from her property in Bridgetown WA.

Trained by Nadine Merewether, she’ll be riding in the Small Tour with 15-year-old Tudor Expectations by Catango 11.

“We have been across the Nullarbor before and I’ve been to some other Nationals in the past. My first was when they were held in Perth in 1979, and then I went to them in Melbourne and Adelaide.

“The horse I’m competing on now placed at Elementary and Medium level in the S.A. champs, and he did well in the freestyle which we’ll be riding in Sydney – it’s the music from ‘New York New York’.”

Before starting out across the desert Karen, who’s an NCAS coach, administers ‘Gastrogard’ for stomach ulcers and electrolytes. During the long journey the horse is taken off the float at intervals and rested.

“My trusty husband will be with me and my daughter will fly over to watch. This will be our annual holiday and we’re going to have fun!”

Another person travelling many kilometres across the sky as opposed to the desert, is Peter Holler, who will be judging at the Nationals.

He has recently been officiating at ‘Dressage at Devon’ a premier North American equestrian event in Pennsylvania, and prior to that judged at the World Cup in Las Vegas.

He has recently been selected on to the ground jury for the Rio Olympics.

He was born in Freiburg, a South German university city in the Black Forest. He has ridden and competed in all three equestrian disciplines, trained with Germany’s best and obtained an Economics degree.

For many years he ran a public relations business and in his spare time trained several successful international dressage riders.

He is on the FEI panel of International 5* judges and officiates at major shows in Germany and around the world.

Before arriving in Sydney he would have spent some time at Equidays, a national equine event in New Zealand.

His fellow judges comprising the international Ground Jury at the Saddleworld 2015 Australian Championships will be Janet Foy (USA), Alban Tissot (France) and Sue Hobson (NZL) and they will be joined by Australian international and National judges.

The Saddleworld Australian Dressage Championships will be held over 5 days from 21-25th October 2015.

To keep up with the latest, visit the Australian Dressage Championships
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For more information click on to: www.dressagensw.equestrian.org.au or contact: Cathie Drury-Klein email: cathiedk@bigpond.com phone 0417 224 432 Deb MacNicol email: dmacnicol@bigpond.com phone 0411 855 187