The cone lifter: “Courses from twenty years ago relevant again”

In 2023, the issue first came to light. “We discovered that the cones in the cones phase were gradually shifting outward. During that competition, we had to remeasure all the gates after every driver; otherwise, it simply wasn’t fair. As the cones shifted, the gates became wider, and if you hit one, the chance of the ball falling was reduced. In addition, we saw carriages with trimmed rubber at the bottom of the wheels, making the track width slightly narrower than those with standard rubber,” explains course designer Jeroen Houterman. He was part of the FEI working group that was subsequently established under the leadership of Andrew Counsell.