HD World

I apologize, loyal readers, for the dearth of material from the World Equestrian Games. I have been working around the clock, and have been lucky to get a few hours of sleep each night.

This morning I got here before 6 and none of the trucks were open, so I trotted up to the top of Rolex Stadium and snapped a few pre-dawn photos of my world:

Carr-Hughes / NBC compound.
Who's who in the zoo.
Don't forget The Bee!
Office space.

And the end result is.......this.

FEI HONORS THE SKUNK!

Jump #3 in the opening Speed Class at the World Equestrian Games...


FEI HONORS THE SKUNK.


I guess it would be more correct to write "FEI honors the skunk". It is not a case of "FEI honors The Skunk". In other words, nobody outside of the FEI TV office knows me from Ted Koppel.

World Equestrian Games

After 2 1/2 years of preparation, it's finally here.

A lot of work ahead, but I've got my own office. With a T3 line! Wheeeeeeeee!

They're Packin'm in At Spruce Meadows

Nations Cup day. What....are they giving away free beer? The place is packed.

Not one empty seat in this grandstand.

Nor in this one.
Also Holland day. Tulips and clogs.

The Americans won! Wheeeeeeeeeeeee!

Holland: Close but no cigar.
Look at that fabulous video wall interface. Who is the ingenious programmer who came up with that? Oh yeah, that would be....me.
Big flags on the video wall for the Nations Cup. Big sponsor logo (BMO) too.

It's Raining..... It's Pouring..... And Q.E.D, The Old Man....

.....the old man must be in Calgary for The Masters at Spruce Meadows.


Soggy at Spruce.


Must be The Masters - says so right on top of the grandstand.

One good thing about rain: the gloomy skies make the video walls look like they're a few billion candlepower.
Foul weather gear.

It's All Taking Shape at TBird

Notice the integration of video and timing data. The cycling video is an AVI from Solvang TT at the Tour of California last year.


A rack mount holds all the guts.

This studly young feller is the boss of showjumping operations at Thunderbird



The "real" mounting hardware won't be here until tomorrow, so for now the display is strapped to a flatbed.

Christmas in August. And it's 92 degrees. In Vancouver.

Overseeing delivery & installation of the new Signco-EDS video wall to Thunderbird Show Park in Langley, BC.

Instead of cold & drizzling, there's not a cloud in the sky and it's 92 degrees. In Vancouver?




Their old Daktronics Galaxy is looking like the middle-aged wife who's just been dumped for the hot blonde grad student.

Thunderbird has it's Grand Prix weekend next week, so this is all happening just in time.

There's Hot. And Then There's FUCKING Hot.

To call Puerto Rico in July Africa-hot is a fair claim.

The good news is that scoring & timing is in an air-conditioned tent. The bad news is that the judges claim they can't see properly through the clear plastic side of the tent, so they draw the tent side back during classes - thus letting all the A/C flow out.

Grrrrrrrr.

The clear plastic looks pretty clear to me. But hey, I'm not a judge.
The finish of the 3-Day Eventing Showjumping phase.

I couldn't find a Daktronics board or a video wall to rent locally, so I'm using 3 D-Lines boards.
3-Day Eventing participants walk the course.
Ooops. Forgot to put the ladder away.
Despite the fact that equestrian is the most expensive sport in the Central American Games to produce, not having it for a Pan Am or Central American Games is out of the question due to the importance of equestrian sports to the participating countries' military forces. Many Central and South American countries still train their officers on horseback.

There were 4 or 5 military officers in the 3-Day Eventing, including a General. A Sergeant finished 2nd.
A better view of the D-Lines (and the ladder).
Joe and Dustin, from Spruce Meadows., are my crew here. Notice the slight fuzziness of this photo. I had just walked out of one of the air-conditioned tents into the inferno, and the humidity in the air instantly fogged my camera lens.
This is Guillermo. He's San Juan's District Attorney. I'm told he's a major bad-ass in his professional life, and is known throughout the country. He's sort of the Elliot Spitzer of Puerto Rico, minus Spitzer's hooker scandal. He has taken a week off to help manage the equestrian venue. He has been very helpful to the scoring & timing crew.

Great guy. Until you break a law, evidently.

Rain Rain Rain Horses Horses Horses

The rain continues to fall here at the Central American and Carribean Games in Puerto Rico.

The main arena is pretty much under water. Today the cross-country course walk-through for the Eventing competitors was canceled, because much of the course is inaccessible due to flooding. If you can't ride an X-C course ON A HORSE, then it's really, REALLY flooded.

Tomorrow the dressage starts. Fortunately, the ROC didn't have enough money left to hire us to collect the dressage scores electronically, so keeping 5 laptops running out in a flooded arena isn't my problem.

I also was unable to locate a video wall to rent locally, so I'm using 3 ALGE D-Line displays. That also proved to be a blessing in disguise, as the archway built by the ROC is keeping the D-Lines way up above the muck, and a portable video wall would no doubt be slowly sinking into the sand, well past the axles on the trailer.

Although you can't see it from this angle, the whole structure is no longer quite level. One side is sinking into the muck a little faster than the other. Not too obvious, yet. All the trailers also are no longer level, as they are sinking at uneven rates, too.

Like the banners? My idea. I had them made by Speedy Graphics in Kahului. I thought they would be a nice touch. Lots of nice comments from the ROC about the banners.

Meadows On The Green

The old monochrome amber video wall from the Clock Tower has been moved to MOG, now that the Clock Tower has a really nice full-color wall. Actually, I shouldn't refer to this amber display as a "video wall", because it only displays about 4 shades of monochrome. It's really just a matrix scoreboard with 1980's technology.

This is what it looked like up on the Clock Tower, last year.

The Clock Tower now sports a full-color VW known as CHINA3, which has really enhanced the presentation in the International Arena. There are 3 other video walls in the International Arena, which is fairly humongous and has about 6 or 7 sides.

Back at Spruce Meadows.....

Back at Spruce Meadows for The North American. Stay tuned, interesting things are bound to happen.

Bayamon, Puerto Rico: The Showjumping Stadium at Central American & Carribean Games

The main reason for my visit to Puerto Rico was to survey the equestrian venue at Julio Monagas Park in Bayamon. Skunkware is doing the timing & scoring for all timed events, i.e. the 3-Day X-C, the 3-Day showjumping, and all the showjumping.

Puerto Rico has received record rains over the past month. Note the massive amounts of mud ringing the main showjumping arena. This tractor is spreading more sand for the jumping surface.


Puddles in the sand arena. There is still a massive amount of painting, grading, and pretty-ing up on the punch list. Note the lights. The showjumping classes will all be held in the late afternoons, as the Puerto Rican climate is too hot, and therefore too hard on the horses, to hold classes in the heat of the day. Just in case the classes run late, the lights will kick in.

The water jump for the 3-Day X-C needs some work....but it suffers from no shortage of water.

The ROC has, very shrewdly, designed the 3-Day X-C course so that it both starts and finishes in the showjumping ring. GREAT IDEA, from the standpoint of spectator seating, timing, scoreboards, sponsorship signage, hospitality, and about a zillion other things. Would be nice if some other events I know (which shall remain nameless) would design their venues this cleverly.



No shortage of electrical power.

The main warmup ring, immediately adjacent to the main sand ring. The In-Gate to the main arena is visible on the far right.

This is the pre-warmup ring, which is up on a bluff, so it drains extremely well. Even so, there are still a few puddles from the record rains.