Team spirit

Show jumping is a sport that requires a rider on a horse to overcome obstacles. If one person makes a mistake, the whole team is disqualified or loses points. Thus, joint effort and correct perception of teammates’ intentions is very important in the sport.

It was the first time that the Donbasstour had been classified as a five-star event, and the prize money of the tournament reached 400,000 euros. The tournament was honored by presence of the famed rider Lorenzo. However, it lasted just three days this time, unlike in previous years when the event dragged on for a whole month. The winners of this show jumping event included two Ukrainians, Alisa Danilova and Oleh Krasiuk. Unfortunately, another Ukrainian Maryna Vynnychenko lost her competition.

Financing, infrastructure, and, finally, the media coverage of the sport are very important not just for the sport itself, but for its promotion effort, too. In the UK, equestrian sport is virtually a national (royal) business, and it is respected accordingly. It should be noted also that soccer, swimming, and other sports also receive a lot of attention in that country and have sufficient infrastructure. Such attitude to the equestrian sport is absent in Ukraine as of yet, as well as the tradition to attend such events wearing hats and beautiful suits or dresses. However, the first phenomenon results from the second and creates it at the same time. The place where the event was held is astonishingly huge: the Donbas Equicentre is one of the largest facilities of its kind in Europe, comprising the sand-surfaced warm-up and tournament fields, three stationary stables, indoor arena, 250-stall summer stables, and stands accommodating up to 1,500 spectators. However, it is nothing compared to the Donbas Arena which seats 53,000 people (that is, 35 times more!). The equestrian sport is underrepresented even in Donetsk media space compared to soccer and hockey.