Competition Attempts to Ride Out the Flaws : Equestrian: Many of the top athletes and horses wind up missing the Festival.

While some sports at the U.S. Olympic Festival are showcasing their top athletes, others are not. Swimming, for example, excluded swimmers who have competed internationally. And in the equestrian competition, top athletes were allowed but didn’t show up and top horses were available but were not allowed.

In show jumping, one of the two equestrian disciplines on display at the L.A. Equestrian Center, the horses are not ready for the 1992 Olympics and neither are most of the riders. In dressage, the other half of the competition, several riders were of Olympic caliber but the horses were not.

What’s going on? With no prize money to be won, all of the country’s top show jumpers, including No. 1-ranked Candice Schlom of Calabasas, passed up the Festival to ride on the lucrative European circuit this summer.

Most of the show jumpers here were juniors for whom the Festival was “a training ground for future Olympics,” said Bonnie Blake, assistant executive director of the American Horse Shows Assn., the national governing body for equestrians.

In dressage--slower, more esoteric and far less financially rewarding than show jumping--the Festival was an attractive event for top riders, who are used to competing only for “fame and glory,” said Marie Meyers of Newbury Park, an alternate in dressage on the 1988 U.S. Olympic team and a member of the West dressage team at the Festival.

“When I competed in Europe last year, I heard more about the Olympic Festival than the World Championships,” Meyers added. “My goal for my horse this year was making the Festival.”

But because the AHSA considers the Festival an “intermediate championship,” Blake said, dressage riders had to certify that their horses were two levels below Olympic quality, a requirement that didn’t sit well with Hilda Gurney, a two-time Olympian in dressage and a member of the West team.

“It’s a funny rule,” said Gurney, who lives in Moorpark. “They should let your horse drop back (in class).”

While show jumping has become a big event on both coasts, dressage has traditionally tilted to the east, so the Festival provided a rare chance for West Coast dressage riders to compete at home against their eastern counterparts.

Meyers, Gurney, Shelly Lawder of Camarillo and Leslie Webb of Bakersfield represented the West in team dressage Monday night, but they came in second to the East team.

“Riding for a team is a totally different ballgame” from riding as an individual, Meyers said. “The pressure is different when three other riders depend on you.”

The Festival was intended to benefit young riders and young horses, particularly dressage horses, who usually compete outdoors before small crowds. The Festival provided experience in front of large crowds and in a semi-enclosed indoor arena with unpredictable lighting.

“My horse is very, very sensitive to external stimuli,” Gurney said about Lavinia, a 7-year-old Trakehner mare.

“Dressage horses are used to peace and quiet,” said Meyers, who rode Extrordinaire, a 6-year Dutch Warmblood gelding.

Even show-jumping horses, accustomed to obstacles in their path, had some trouble with the shadows. The sun played games with the light at the Equestrian Center because of the 6 p.m. starting time. During team competition on the first night, the No. 10 fence was particularly bothersome.

“The shadows made the horses spooky,” said Gaby Salick, a 17-year-old junior show jumper from Thousand Oaks and a member of the West team.

Riding Cassandra, a 10-year-old Holsteiner mare, Salick had 8 1/4 faults in the first round, but “felt more comfortable and knew what the problems were” in the second round, clearing all 15 obstacles cleanly but losing a quarter of a point because of a time fault.

Her teammates, Lauren Hough of Morgan Hills, Calif., and Valerie Parr of Santa Ana, also scored well in leading the West to an easy win.

“It’s the best feeling,” Salick said afterward, holding a bouquet. A senior at Westlake High, Salick hopes to move up to the open division within a year and to the grand prix level “in a few years.”

And if grand prix riders like Schlom had been at the Festival? “Our team would have held its own,” said Salick, who finished fourth in individual show jumping.