I'm hoping someone can answer this question for me. I've lived in Ocala most all my life. I was at UF when much of the Title 9 comparisons talk started up in the 80s. I forget when it was passed but I'm mostly for it as long as other sports aren't held back because of it. My question is, why in the world doesn't UF have an equestrian team? Or a beach volleyball team for that matter? Ocala is considered one of the Horse Capital's of the World. We have one of the top notch World Equestrian Centers right here. We have the Florida Horse Park for training and events. The NCEA held their last equestrian national championships at the WEC as I recall. UF has had several important speeches in the last year at the WEC, including Dr. Fuchs. UF has a UF Vet Hospital at the WEC. Instead we watch schools like Auburn, Georgia, South Carolina, and Texas A&M compete for National Championships in a sport that we could dominate. It doesn't make sense. Equestrian is one of the easier sports for high school girls to get a scholarship opportunity for those that compete at an earlier age. Yes its cost restrictive because of the costs of owning a horse and the risk of injury to the rider and the animal. I've spoken to several girls in the Ocala area that are hoping for a scholly from Auburn or Georgia so they can go to school and compete in a sport they love, while wishing Florida was an option. Which makes me wonder how do Auburn and Georgia handle the same risks and costs but manage to keep the team going. I don't post over here in the other sports very often so I may not continue watching this thread long. I get the obvious answer is Title 9 but I'm hoping someone on here on the inside can share more details what is going on other than someone is studying it. Thanks
Seems like we opted for Lacrosse....which has a larger roster and perhaps goes further toward matching the number of male/female athletes. Honestly beach volleyball seems like a no brainer since it would be the cheapest sprort to sponsor by far, and would mesh well with existing volleyball team. Equestrian does make a lot of sense, but on the surface would seem to be quite expensive in comparison to number of athletes participating.
I love lacrosse, but think the equestrian team makes a lot of sense for all of the reasons @Matherly87 stated. Beach volleyball would be very inexpensive to start up, whereas an equestrian program would be pretty expensive. I'm saying the same thing @apkgator said above, but with the resources UF has, there's no reason we couldn't easily do both and be immediately competitive at the national level.
The university I teach at has an equestrian team (actually teams - all four seats) and it is very expensive.
Alachua is not horse country. I live out in rural alachua. Cows and hay fields, hardly any horses. Ocala is horse country.
Certainly Ocala is also. But I know a lot of people (some relatives) who work on and with horse farms in and around Alachua.
First of all I think title9 has almost all to do with it.when my daughter was at uf in the early 2000's she was a very good rider,worked at the horse training unit and was told that Foley did not want sports that the sec could not hold a championship for or be eligible for the director cup.like above there might be 7 or 8 riders plus you cannot take your horse away,the host school had to provide them and I believe it is a blind draw between for schools to avoid 1 getting the better horse.
Cows and hay fields out here, man. Hardly any horses. One or two small farms I know of and a lot of people with a couple horses. Nothing like you see in ocala or even south williston. Outside of the equestrian center in Newberry, which was a dump before the county took over and wasted a bunch of our money there while neglecting our roads, there ain’t much for big horse operations out here.
Marion County has over 1200 horse farms and over 35,000 thoroughbreds. Alachua County has about 100 horse farms.
My youngest daughter was employed by the Donovan’s (well, mostly Mrs. Donovan) to drive one of their daughters from Gainesville to Ocala for dressage or horse jumping or some kinda horse riding/jumping lessons a coupla times per week back in the day.
