December looks bleak for horse showing in New Jersey following the issuance of new Covid rules. State mandates on indoor sporting competitions stopped allowing indoor shows beginning Dec.5, through Jan. 2. Outdoor shows can run, but no more than 25 people at a time can be on the showgrounds outside..
“I think it’s done,” U.S.Hunter Jumper Association Director Katie Benson said on Tuesday about December showing in the Garden State. She spoke during the Zone 2 (New Jersey, Pennsylvania and New York) meeting at USHJA’s virtual convention. The idea seems to be “to keep people home for the holidays,” she commented. At the same time that shows can’t go on in an effort to prevent the spread of the virus, it’s okay for everyone to stand in line at Walmart, she observed wryly.
Andrew Philbrick of Hunter Farms in Princeton, who cancelled a two-day show scheduled for Dec. 19-20, agreed with Katie that “the month of December is going to be a shutdown.”
Mark Leone, the Zone 2 chairman, wondered what will happen after Jan.2, asking what can be salvaged.
“What do we do, just sit tight?” he commented. “It’s so unpredictable. There’s nothing to be done.”