I’ve been involved with ERA for a few years now, and genuinely can’t remember how I got involved, which is a bit worrying! I am chief FBer and Twitterer for ERA, in charge of amassing goodies for prizes for any parties that we have, and help to organise the social side. I also process all the Event Feedbacks we receive and liaise with Organisers about them, calling in our Chief Firefighter and Big Gun (Francis Whittington, our Chairman) if a real problem is encountered and my diplomacy is not enough! Help is always needed with all of these so if anyone fancies it, please get in touch.
ERA’s latest campaign on behalf of riders is the petition to the FEI asking for further relaxation of the MERs. It can be found at the top of our Homepage – please read it, sign if you agree, and spread the word. The FEI meeting is on 4 March, this is urgent! Many riders are very unfairly impacted by these shock new rules.
ERA (UK) is for all UK based event riders. Nick Wallbridge does a lot of the liaising with BE, and Francis does most of the liaising with the FEI, for instance we have already negotiated some relaxations to the new MERs and qualification rules for this season.
Recently I attended the BE meeting at Stoneleigh regarding the 2014 Fixtures List as an ERA Representative, which was genuinely fascinating. I had no idea quite how much planning, shuffling and diplomacy is required to set up the next year’s events. There are changes due to the location of the Commonwealth Games (?!), when Bank Holidays fall, plus farming influences such as lambing and crops, as well as taking underlying soil and drainage issues into account, and how workable it is at a given venue at various times of the year, e.g. how machine-able for xc if the weather is very dry.
There are venues being shuffled around all the time, new events to be slotted in, Organisers with big plans who sometimes must prove themselves at a lower level at a new venue, landowners who have sometimes invested truly eye-watering amounts of money before their first ever event… and add into the mix the need to work out how many CICs and CCIs will be required (almost impossible with the new MERs situation, but too many and Organisers won’t get enough entries to be viable, too few and Riders and Owners will be hugely frustrated), slotting in new CIs in an already packed calendar, dealing with Organisers who do not want any other event to clash with theirs unless it is literally at the other end of the country… it’s a daunting task but one that is handled really impressively.
If you have any questions about ERA or want to get involved, I can be contacted at feedback@eventridersassociation.org.uk
