Media Training Vital at All Levels of Equestrian Sport Organization

Most media relations problems have a reason behind them that is pretty glaring to anyone who understands the media. Members of the equestrian community (and many other niche-market sports) complain if they don’t get coverage. They also complain if they get covered but the story isn’t exactly what they would have liked. It’s interesting to hear and read the rationale of some of those who are first to complain about no coverage or less-than-perfect coverage. It only proves the need for media training at all levels of an organization – especially if that organization is seeking sponsors, spectators and higher visibility. Media training is about changing a mind-set, as much or more as it is about skills.

 

I’ve written here before about how you can’t develop a relationship with the media unless you get the facts straight. You must be equipped with accurate facts. Journalists don’t like to be made fools of by printing or broadcasting your inaccurate facts. I’ve also written before that good media relations begins at the grassroots of any organization. Change the mind-set at that level and you pave the way for a brighter relationship with the media in the future. I also always stress the importance of not blaming the messenger if you don’t like the news. All of these rules of thumb came to light today.

 

I was reading an internet forum for equestrians. It’s not media coverage, but it is in the public domain. And, these presumed-to-be-young participants are the grassroots of the sport — the future of the sport. Someone had made a post about the #1-ranked show jumper in the world, with a headline exclaiming that he was the “World Champion”. I logged in and pointed out that, while being the #1-ranked rider in the world is an outstanding achievement, it does not constitute holding the title of World Champion. Rankings constantly evolve and the only person who can claim the title of World Champion is the person who won that contest. Just like the only person who can be called the Olympic gold medalist is the rider who won the gold medal at the Olympics. The same is true of the Pan American Games, the World Cup or any other sporting event. My point was only to help these presumed-to-be young equestrians understand what these titles mean.

 

A couple of responses pondered the situation, one noting that she had picked up on the same error. Then several responses served to illustrate the systemic mind-set that is the root of most media relations problems. One posted “WHO cares about all of the technical BS” and commented that it made her need a smoke. A chorus joined in in agreement.

 

Technical BS? These young equestrians will grow up someday (with any luck) and may  play a role in the administration of the sport. Or they may be competitors who speak to the media, representing the sport. Hopefully, they will no longer believe that you can arbitrarily ordain someone “World Champion”. Sport does not work that way. By comparison, I cannot say I am an Olympic athlete because I’ve been to several Olympic Games. I was there as a journalist, not a competitor. The difference is not “technical BS”.

 

Good media relations begins at the grassroots level. Accurate facts are near the top of a journalist’s list of needs. The line between accurate and inaccurate is not “technical BS”.

Showing the Horse or Competing?

The equestrian community reacted with outrage recently to Olympic media coverage that stated riders are not athletes. Some journalists declared that “the horse did all the work” and “the Olympics are for human athletes”. Based on that opinion, they rationalized that equestrian sport should not be part of the Olympic Games.

 

However, riders don’t realize that they perpetuate that image with their terminology. It is not unusual to hear a rider say, in an interview, that he is “showing the horse”. I heard riders at the Olympic Games tell journalists, “I haven’t shown him for amonth” or “This is the last time I will show him for a while”. If he or she is simply “showing the horse”, then why is he or she an athlete? How can those journalists be blamed for having that, arguably, wrong impression?

 

The term “showing the horse” is really most accurate when talking about line classes, where a horseman stands the horse to show him properly to the judges. This takes skill, but it doesn’t make that horseman an athlete. The term was not intended for grand prix and Olympic show jumping.

 

Athletes in other sports “compete”. Show jumpers “show the horse”. Which one sounds more like an athlete to you?

The Trouble With the Word “Equestrian”

Terminology makes getting good media coverage difficult in many subject areas. Equestrian sport is one of the most problematic subjects when it comes to language. Those involved in the sport have a lingo of their own. It is well understood by them. Many of them grow up speaking it. It is not well understood by the general public, making it difficult to attract new fans, new participants, and those ever-important sponsors.

This problem can easily be overcome. There are plain-English, replacement terms, for almost every bit of “lingo” that is commonly used in the sport.

Surprisingly, however, one of the most problematic words is “equestrian”. There are a lot of different sports that can be accurately described with this adjective. However, the word is most commonly associated with the three English-riding Olympic equestrian sports. But, the dictionary defines equestrian as “having to do with horses”. That opens up a wide variety of ways in which it can be used.

One of the problems is that it is often used as if it is one sport. A good example is the recent broadcast of an equestrian three-day event on a major American television network. They promoted this broadcast as “equestrian championships”. This was particularly problematic because the equestrian sport involved had received some disturbingly negative coverage shortly before this broadcast in one of the world’s largest newspapers. Therefore, it causes all equestrian sport to be hurt by the negative publicity of one. It is a good illustration of how poor terminology can actually cause “bad press”.

Something similar happened in a Canadian newspaper recently, when they reported that Canadian riders were going to compete in the “Equestrian World Cup”. There are World Cups in several equestrian sports. This was not detrimental publicity, but a good example of confusion that can be caused by terminology that is not clear.

It’s easy to see how the naming of the U.S. television broadcast happened. The equestrian sport in question uses a name that is not sufficiently descriptive for the public or journalists to understand. What was formerly the equestrian “three-day event” (also not sufficiently descriptive, as events that are three days in length take place in almost every sport) or “horse trials” (somewhat better) has undergone a name change to “eventing”. The network was clearly trying to avoid the use of this noun-turned-verb that offers no description of what is going to take place.

But, media relations for show jumping is the subject of this blog. The choice of the American network is just offered as an example of how problematic the word “equestrian” can be.

One way to overcome the problem would be to have more descriptive names for each of the sports that fall into the “equestrian” catagory. “Equestrian jumping” or ”horse jumping” would be an improvement over ”show jumping”.

Clear, plain-English terms make anything easier to understand. There will be many future posts on improving the lingo of this sport to make it more media-friendly.