The World Cup is a three-phase event held over multiple days that decides the best horse rider combination in the world each year. When an event like this happens within 1,000 miles of your home you really should go, and take your mom too. That's what I did and here's how it all went down...

Both Show Jumping and Dressage World Cup Finals were being held at the same time, so my mom and I encountered other equestrians in route to Las Vegas. We arrived at the Thomas Mack Arena late Wednesday afternoon. We picked up a schedule and tickets for the upcoming events. Dressage schooling was going on. Show Jumpers had schooled earlier that day. After my mom and I had familiarized ourselves with the facility we headed off to have drinks and dinner with our dressage buddies. Before dinner, in the bar we had a photo shoot entitled "World Cup show jumping and dressage comingle in Las Vegas". (Those pictures will be sold separately!)

Thursday competition began.

Dressage started the four days of equestrian events. Now I'm not much of a dressage enthusiast but considering these were the best in the world I thought I might take a peek. It was cool. I can appreciate what it takes to get these horses to this point and as usual the best make it look easy. Debbie McDonald is the closest to a Pacific Northwest hometown favorite. She ended up third, two riders from the Netherlands were on top. Edward Gul topped the field and Anky Van Grunsuen was sitting second. Which was apparently some kind of upset because Edward Gul is a student of Anky's and in World Cup dressage things like that just don't happen.

Okay on to the show jumping.

I was so excited for the show jumping. The course was big and beautiful. Lots of bending lines, a triple combination and a double, the course was set by designer Guilherme Noguelra of Brazil. The first leg of the World Cup is a speed round, faults converted to time. The first horse came in, Constantine 24, a beautiful bay Holsteiner with Markus Beerbaum in the irons. He jumped around clean and fast, making it look like just another day at the office. It took quite a long time for anyone to beat his time. When he was beat it was another German, Markus Ehning on Gitania 8, a beautiful 13-year-old gray Holsteiner. He didn't hold the lead for long-the next rider in the ring, Ludo Philiparts of Belgium beat Markus's time by more than a second. Ludo's time proved unbeatable, he won the class and led World Cup competition after the first leg.

The Americans had a pretty good showing with a couple of casualties. Olympic veteran Laura Kraut parted ways with her horse, Anthem, and Lauren Hough, a young rider, from Florida fell victim to two refusals resulting in elimination. The most promising U.S. rider looked to be Kimberly Frey aboard the Dutch mare Marlou. She finished fourth, with the next U.S. finish going to Schuyler Riley on her 15 year old Dutch gelding, Ilian, finishing in 12th position.

Many Northwest equestrians attended the World Cup and the best place to bump into them was on the concourse outside the seating area. Many could also be found in the Equifair trade booths, buying and trying all the new and cool stuff for equine athletes. If you were a real groupie, like me, you'd be seen hanging out at the VIP lounges hoping to catch a glimpse of one of the World Cup hopefuls like Meredith Michaels Beerbaum or Markus Ehning.

Then, at the end of every day I got to do my favorite thing. I would walk past the long line of people waiting for a cab, and head for my hotel, just a seven minute walk from the Thomas Mack arena. That night, a lot of my Northwest friends and colleagues were just slipping into a cab when I was slipping my first $20 into the slots at the Hard Rock Casino.

Day two, the second leg of the World Cup, was a timed first jump off class. Then jumps were built much more stout and the course longer than day one. Two trouble spots turned up on course. A vertical set three strides (61' 8") after a triple combination on a tough angle. Riders didn't have much time to get their horse's eyes on the vertical.

The other difficult spot was the last three fences, a vertical set 49' 8" to a vertical, and then 45' 4" to an oxer. Now a normal three-stride line is 48' so the distance between two verticals is forward but doable. Then what? 45' 4" is way too long for two strides but if you did the three, yikes, your brakes have to be applied early and often. A lot of people put a slight bend in the first part of the line and did four strides to a three--but not too many successfully. The leader from the previous day fell victim to this line. He bent for the four and knocked the middle element of this difficult combination.

No Americans made it into the jump off, but I saw marked improvement in their riding. It looked as though someone had fired them up a little. They were coming through their turns better and overall had a more determined expression about them. Two U.S. riders seemed to really be riding well, Schuyler Riley and Kimberly Frey. Two other U.S. riders opted to change over to their other World Cup horses. Richard Spooner rested Robinson and rode Hilton Flight, who ended up in tenth place Friday, and Georgina Bloomberg rode her other qualified horse Riviera. These riders made good decisions based on their horse's standings in the competition thus far.

Meredith Michaels Beerbaum of Germany on Shutterfly won this second leg of the World Cup. She was smooth, fast, clean, and 2/10th of a second faster than second place finisher Alios P. Schweckhorst on Candy, also from Germany. Third went to Steve Guerdat on Isoulas Pialotta from Switzerland. Steve must have been thrilled. He didn't really qualify for the World Cup but earned a spot when his other teammates declined to come. His third place finish in this class put him in the top ten for the final on Sunday.

Saturday the World Cup horses rested and Las Vegas put on a Grand Prix. Each rider could only ride one horse, which evens out the playing field. At this point in the competition quite a few US riders decided to bow out of the World Cup competition but maybe get some more experience over a lower course and a chance at $50,000 in prize money. Other riders who had competed in World Cup qualifiers but not earned enough points to compete in the finals joined them. It was an exciting class, four of the five horses to make the jump off were from the U.S. Eric Van der Veleuten from the Netherlands on Audi's Jikke won the class by 1/10th of a second over Olympic veteran from the U.S. Anne Kursinski on Roxanna 12. Richard Spooner made it to the jump off on Robinson however he had a little trouble when he tried to cut his time short at the second fence and had a refusal and a rail down, resulting in an 8-fault score and a 5th place finish. At the conclusion of the class Robinson was honored in a retirement ceremony Las Vegas style. Spooner and Robinson have held many titles throughout their careers together and it's always sad to see a horse with so much character leave the show jumping scene.

Also featured on Saturday was the AHJF Hunter Challenge. Four top U.S. hunter riders faced off against four top international show jump riders on eight of the country's top show hunters, including one from the northwest, Carson, owned by Janie Andrews. The first round was judged like an open hunter class, the second round was a Handy Hunter Class. At the conclusion of each round scores were posted by six judges, who worked in pairs to produce three scores that were then averaged to produce each rider's final score. After each round, the teams would drop the lowest score and add the others together for a team total. Without getting too long-winded about this Hunter Challenge, the international show jump riders put on a beautiful demonstration of horse mastering-once again proving that good riding is just good riding and, when done properly, displays a sense of style and finesse that encourages a pleasant expression and a fluid stride in a horse. The international Jumper riders beat the pants off the U.S. Hunter riders. Michael Whitaker ended up with the highest single round score and In Sync, a horse owned by Stephanie Danhakl, was the high score horse.

Saturday night was the dressage final and I'll have to admit I watched most of the first five riders from the VIP lounge on the big screen TV. But when it came down to the top five riders in the world, well, this I needed to see in real time. First I watched Jan Brink of Sweden, and then Hubertus Schmidt of Germany. They were good but I couldn't get into the music. Robert Dover was the next and-wow-things were getting better. I'm no judge on the technicalities of dressage but it seemed as if Robert and his horse had a pretty good rhythm and flow going on. Then Debbie McDonald from Sun Valley, Idaho on Brentina took it to another level with a brand new freestyle never before performed in front of an audience. She worked it and worked it well. They brought the audience to their feet at the conclusion of their performance and once again became America's darling of the dressage ring. The scores came in and averaged 83.45. I don't know what that means but everyone got excited. Then came Edward Gal on Geldnet Lingh from the Netherlands. Believe it or not, me, Tami Masters, grand prix show jump rider and overall thrill seeker was on the edge of my seat watching dressage. He also put in a spectacular round with a near perfect freestyle routine and maybe his horses gaits were slightly more impressive then Debbie's. The final score for Edward was 85.225.

Okay now this is where subjective judging gets a little screwy. The final pair comes in, Keltec Salinero with Anky Van Grunsven, the Netherlands Grand Diva. Well, to be quite honest I watched her routine and after the second mistake I headed down to the VIP lounge. I was sure Edward Gal was going to win and Brentina would be second so you can imagine my surprise when I'm sitting down in the VIP lounge indulging myself in a bit of liquid refreshment and Anky scores 86.725. She had won, I was way off base. I guess I'm going to have to put my dressage judging future on hold till I figure out what the heck they're looking for. Thank the good lord for show jumping. If the horse and rider work harmoniously through the course of jumps then the rider should not incur any faults. Then if he can do the same thing really fast he can win. If a show jump rider doesn't ride harmoniously with his horse, if she's fighting with or not making good decisions she incurs faults and will not be able to go faster till she gets better. Plain and simple. So, anyway, my dressage friends and I had much to talk about after the dressage final.

Sunday was the show jumping final. Two rounds with the possibility of a jump off. No jump off was necessary this year. So much can and did change on the last day. But not the leader, Meredith Michaels Beerbaum showed the equestrian world and all that watched what a woman can do when she is prepared and "well mounted". She showed consistency and great execution of the World Cup plan. She is with all my respect and admiration the best show jump rider in the world. Michael Whitaker from Great Britian was 2nd on Portofino with 7 faults, and there was a tie for third between Markus Ehning on Gitania 8 and Lars Nieberg on Lucie 55, both with 9 faults apiece. The closest American to the winner was Kimberly Frey on Marlou who finished 5th with 10 faults and some really consistent rounds.

I ended my World Cup experience feeling inspired, motivated, and anxious to get home and set that exercise, vertical, 49'8" to vertical, 45'4" to oxer, and practice, practice, practice. The next World Cup is in Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia and the US maybe looking for riders like me.