AT 49 but still keen to scale new heights, Sydney Olympic Games veteran and equestrian rider Toni Leviste is rekindling her Olympic dream, shifting from her pet show jumping event to dressage in a bid to qualify for the 2024 Paris Summer Games.
“I’m trying to dream another dream and climb a new mountain that has never been done in equestrian sports in any country by anybody, which is to shift disciplines,” Leviste said in the Goal Diggers podcast organized by Xmplar the other day.
“I have been a show jumper for the last 40 years but I have shifted to dressage in the last three months. While it is still equestrian, it’s like learning a new language; like learning Greek,” the 2005 Southeast Asian Games gold medalist noted. “The change sounds like the easier way to go because there is less risk, but the challenge is so much greater.”
Even fellow equestrienne Mikee Cojuangco-Jaworski, a gold medalist in the show jumping event in the 2002 Busan Asian Games, acknowledged that what her friend and fellow rider is seeking to accomplish is no stroll in the park.
“Oh, it’s certainly not easy! It (dressage) is a highly technical discipline that has different demands on both horse and rider, especially at higher levels. It also has a subjective nature, being that there are judges who score the competitors,” Cojuangco, a member of the International Olympic Committee Executive Board, pointed out.
“Toni is a very passionate and committed athlete, I wish her the best, and I am very excited as she embarks on this endeavor! It would be great to watch her compete for the country in the Paris Olympics,” she said in encouragement.
Although still a newbie to the event but underscoring that her shift was a wise choice, Leviste disclosed that she passed the evaluation conducted last July by the International Dressage Academy based in Brno, Czech Republic.
“I had to show my skills as a rider and they the (IDA judges) had to assess me. They ranked me as No. 1 and they accepted so I was so surprised!” Leviste exclaimed
She said she is blessed to be in a sport where both men and women riders are regarded as equals and where age is not an impediment at all for success.
“Equestrian is such a unique sport, there is no division. Men and women can compete equally. And horses as well. It is the only sport where the older you are, the better you become,” Leviste stressed.
Japanese rider Hiroshi Hoketsu is notable for competing in the 2012 London Olympiad at the age of 70.
“The horses are technically the athletes. And you have to have harmony with them.
Whether you are jumping the fences or in dressage you are making the movements, you have to be in harmony with this beast that is 10 times larger, stronger and heavier than you are,” she added.
Already an equestrian rider at 9, Leviste did not mind the sacrifice and effort of going through the grueling Olympic qualifying process to see action in the Paris Summer Games, recalling her own Olympic debut Down Under 22 years ago.
“I’ve learned to visualize an impossible dream. Having qualified the first time in 2000 was a miracle. Because I broke my collar bone eight weeks prior to the Olympics. But I was still able to compete and complete the competition,” Leviste reminisced.
“I intend to go to Paris in 2024 and if that doesn’t happen then there is still Los Angeles in 2028,” she said with determination “Because in equestrian, as I said, the older you are, the better you become.
“And to be able to do it as a Filipino will not only bring pride and honor to the country but also make history. That is what I strive to do. I love to climb new mountains and make the impossible happen.”