The sun was welcome on Saturday, following overnight temperatures of minus 4 degrees, for the commencement of the annual FEI Dressage Spectacular hosted by Tamworth Dressage Club. The idea of a dressage competition, this year held over the weekend of Saturday 16^th and Sunday 17^th June, devoted entirely to Medium through to Grand Prix levels was instigated by Lois Peters, FEI competitor and member of the Tamworth DC. The competition is now in its sixth consecutive year, and in 2001 coincided with the host club's 20^th anniversary. Local businesses has been very generous in providing sponsorship.

The competition venue is the Tamworth showground, which, to my mind, has some of the best country stable facilities going, with plenty of clean, safe, roomy rubber lined boxes and an abundant number of wash bays to stable ratio. The showground proudly boasts an indoor arena where the Prix St Georges through to Grand Prix tests were held over the weekend.

As well as local riders, the competition attracted a strong contingent from the Hunter Valley and competitors from as far away as Queensland. A field of 17 Prix St Georges and 12 Inter 1 competitors provided healthy competition and should be an encouraging sign to the hard working committee. The Prix St Georges Freestyle was well supported, with a Medium/Advanced Freestyle, a Grand Prix Kur and a Keiffer Dressage Leaderboard Qualifier also included in the program.

An anniversary dinner was held on the Saturday night to celebrate Tamworth Dressage Clubs’ 20 years of operation and an invitation was extended to all competitors to attend. Such a fabulous evening for all horse lovers started with a happy hour, followed by dinner and the entertainment was provided by Heath Ryan, as guest speaker. Heath’s enthusiastic presentation was focussed on encouraging competitors to aim towards International competition and portions of his inspiring talk was particularly targeted at the young riders attending the weekends competition.

Sundays competition was held with much warmer weather conditions than Saturday, much to the appreciation of competitors and spectators alike. It was interesting to note the improvement in the overall quality of the riding from previous years, with some particularly nice tests displayed over the weekend.

The hospitality of the Tamworth people and the ensuing friendly atmosphere is guaranteed to encourage riders to return to the Spectacular in coming years.