Welcome Back, FEI World Cup™ Finals! An Overview of the US Hosting History

Get the backstory as Fort Worth is set to join the list of U.S. cities that have hosted the FEI World Cup™ Finals.

As excitement builds for Fort Worth to host the FEI World Cup™ Finals, this isn’t the first rodeo for the U.S. to bring the event to life. The U.S. has welcomed the world’s best horse-and-rider combinations onto its soil on several occasions over the years. We take a trip down memory lane to review past U.S. editions of the FEI World Cup™ Finals and see what lies ahead this year in Texas.

The Early Years of the FEI World Cup™ Finals

In recent years, the FEI World Cup™ Finals have consisted of dressage and jumping championships (as well as the occasional vaulting championship) running concurrently, but they were originally two separate events. The FEI Jumping World Cup™ Final first took place in 1979 in Gothenburg, Sweden, and the inaugural FEI Dressage World Cup™ Final was held in 1986 in ‘s-Hertogenbosch, the Netherlands. It wasn’t until 2005 that the two finals took place at the same location, with Las Vegas, Nevada, serving as the initial joint host city. Vegas held the honor of being the joint host again in 2007 and 2009 until the two championships officially became the FEI World Cup™ Finals in 2011. While Las Vegas has played host to an individual or joint final six times, several other U.S. cities have held the thrilling competition.