Welcome to the Year of Youth's equestrian blog for youth riders, horse lovers and horsey people. Join in the discussion on facebook, twitter, myspace, bebo and flikr.

If you’ve joined us on the Year of Youth Facebook Group, then you may have seen that Richard Johnson (a big cheese at the FEI) who is looking after the Year of Youth has been engaging with young riders and answering your questions.

The FEI is really keen to find out what young people think about equestrianism and we’re really pleased that you’ve been using this fantastic opportunity to ‘Ask the FEI’. Richard’s pretty new to using Facebook groups, but we’re already hearing rumours that he’s already getting hooked – logging in whenever he has a break between meetings so that he can find out what you’re talking about.

He’s not shying away from the big issues either. Emma asked whether the FEI had anything to say about saddleseat, as she believes it is a cruel sport. Richard quickly got in touch with the right people to get a statement on the matter:

“The FEI is a confederation of National Federations put in place in order to govern the sporting disciplines that are practiced at International level. The FEI has put in place rules to ensure that the welfare of the horse is paramount during competitions and also increasingly when the horses are out of competition too. The National Federations and riders all agree to be bound by these rules and policies as a condition of being a part of the FEI Family. The sport of saddleseat is not an FEI discipline and therefore falls outside the jurisdiction of the FEI.”

Richard has also promised to get in touch with the USEF to raise Emma’s comments with them. So if you’ve not joined the group then you’re missing out! Get on over there now and join in the conversation! Richard told us that he’s learning a lot about how youth riders see the sport and is already using your ideas and suggestions to change the way that he works with other people at the FEI. At the Year of Youth HQ we think this is fantastic news! We’re already having an effect and you can be part of it, by joining us on Facebook now.

See you there!

The FEI blogging team