WITH less than three years to go to until the Los Angeles Olympic Games in 2028, the Organising Committee has unveiled the official competition schedule. Equestrian events will kick off with eventing, followed by dressage and then show jumping. The equestrian schedule at the Paralympic Games will be announced at a later date.

The eventing horse inspection will take place on July 14th, the day of the opening ceremony. Competition proper will begin on July 15th at 9am local time with the eventing dressage, which will continue on the following day. The cross-country will be held on July 17th and the first equestrian medals of LA28 will be won on July 18th, following the team and individual eventing show jumping.

The horse inspection for dressage will be on July 18th, prior to the eventing show jumping. The dressage Grand Prix will take place over two days, July 20th and 21st, followed by the Grand Prix Special on July 22nd, which is the dressage team final. There will be no competition scheduled the following day, with the show jumping and the dressage second horse inspections taking place. Sport will resume on July 24th with the dressage individual final - the Grand Prix Freestyle - with the show jumping re-inspection taking place that morning.

The team qualifier in show jumping is scheduled for July 25th with the final planned for July 26th. The second show jumping horse inspection and re-inspection will take place on July 27th and will be followed by the individual qualifier on July 28th. The individual show jumping final will conclude the LA28 Olympic equestrian calendar on July 29th.

Facts and figures

With three disciplines and 200 quota places, equestrian will be one of the 31 sports on the programme of the LA28 Olympic Games. The six medal equestrian events will be part of the 25 mixed events across all sports and the 351 events overall in LA28. The LA28 programme maintains the core athlete quota of 10,500 with an extra 698 allocated for the five sports proposed by the LA28 Organising Committee (Baseball/Softball, Cricket, Flag Football, Lacrosse and Squash).

A record-breaking 50 nations participated in equestrian at the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. The number of nations in Paris 2024 was 49. The number of nations competing in equestrian in Los Angeles in 1984 was 30.

Santa Anita Park in Arcadia, LA, has been confirmed as the venue of the equestrian events for LA28 with Alec Lochore (GBR) as the eventing course designer and Alan Wade (IRL) as the show jumping course designer.

“Following an in-depth presentation of LA28 at the FEI General Assembly 2025 on November 7th in Hong Kong, China, the announcement of the competition schedule for the Olympic Games is great news,” FEI President Ingmar De Vos said. “The equestrian events will take place over 16 days starting on July 14th, the day of the Olympic Games opening ceremony, and ending on July 29th, the day before the closing ceremony. It is well balanced and mindful of horse and athlete welfare. It includes three days without competition, which will allow for the horses and athletes to ease into the event, prepare and rest comfortably. It also permits for adjustments in the event of unforeseen circumstances.

“We are very pleased with the progress in preparations for the LA28 Olympic equestrian events accomplished over the past few months and look forward to continuing our close cooperation with the organising committee over the next three years.”