Del Mar Clears Its Hurdle With Room to Spare : Show jumping: First World Cup event to be held in the West noisily silences the skeptics.

California show-jumping fans, it seems, are acquiring boisterous habits.

When riders completed no-fault rounds during the Volvo World Cup show-jumping championship, the sold-out crowd of about 9,000 stomped, whistled and roared. That is quite unusual for normally sedate U.S. equestrian enthusiasts, although not for some Europeans, particularly Swedes.

And when Switzerland’s Thomas Fruhmann and his gray German-bred Bockmann’s Genius won the final Sunday afternoon with two clean rounds--no jumping faults during the competition--the stands of the new $5.4-million arena at the Del Mar Fairgrounds shook.

Of the continuing din, Bill Steinkraus, U.S. Equestrian Team chairman emeritus, said: “We’re picking up European habits. They even do this at the opera in some European countries.” Steinkraus, the individual gold medalist in show jumping at the 1968 Olympic Games, is president of the Federation Equestre Internationale World Cup committee.

European, Mexican and U.S. riders also voiced approval of such crowd enthusiasm, saying it was probably second only to the rowdy reception they receive at show jumping events in Goteborg, Sweden.

“This World Cup will do more for the West Coast than we could do in the next 10 years,” said Bernie Traurig of Rancho Santa Fe, the hometown favorite with his gelding, Maybe Forever. Traurig finished fifth overall, the best of the 15 U.S. riders.

“I interviewed the riders this week and got a lot of great feedback,” Traurig said. “There was a lot of stigma about the World Cup being here in California. People from Europe were skeptical about coming here. People from the East Coast weren’t so anxious to come, either. But everyone I talked to was extremely positive.”

Before coming to California last week, the 14-year-old Volvo World Cup had been held outside Europe only twice, both times on the East Coast.

Forty-six riders from 13 nations were entered here.

World Cup officials also praised the Del Mar show, saying it offered the overall spectacle of a European horse show, with various equestrian demonstrations, including children bareback on ponies, a cattle-penning exhibition in which some American and Canadian World Cup riders participated, and an equestrian expo that offered almost every kind of horse-related product--for both horses and people--ever invented.

“This is typical of a European horse show,” said Max Ammann of Switzerland, World Cup director. “All these different things are what makes it tick. You need all these things. It’s the same with baseball. You need Cokes and beer and hot dogs. This is a public sport, a big sport equal to anything. Well, I wouldn’t compare it to the Super Bowl, but it’s a big sport, especially in Europe. Here, it deserves to have all the things we have--spectator attention, sponsors, TV.”

What the Del Mar World Cup didn’t need, but got anyway, was serious controversy. Thursday night, during a speed event, Britain’s Tina Cassan aboard Genesis and Germany’s Ludger Beerbaum on Athletico inadvertently misjudged the starting line and would have been eliminated if the World Cup appeals committee had not ruled in their favor.

After a long delay, with the crowd hissing and booing, judges ruled for the two riders. Overall, Beerbaum finished sixth, Cassan seventh.

“Two principles were in conflict,” Steinkraus said. “The rules are the same for everybody, but you have a jumping competition by jumping. It’s a kind of no-win situation. But we made our decision in the case of fairness and justice for the truest interest of the sport.”