In This Guide

1. What an EquiRatings Major Event Preview Contains
2. The Fan Guide: How to Follow Any Event
3. Phase-by-Phase: How Each Phase Is Previewed
4. Venue History and What It Tells Us
5. The Prediction Centre: Win Chance and Podium Probability
6. What Makes a Dark Horse
7. Elo Field Strength: Comparing Competitions
8. Frequently Asked Questions
9. Related Guides

 

Introduction

The entry list tells you who is starting. An EquiRatings preview tells you what is likely to happen, why, and who you should be watching.

Before major competitions EquiRatings publishes — across news.equiratings.com and the Fan Guide library — a detailed breakdown of the field using proprietary metrics, historical venue data, and predictive modelling. Every winner since 2019 at the LiftMaster Grand Prix Eventing Showcase has come from the top three after dressage. No winner of that event has ever knocked a rail in the show jumping. Only 10% of starters have ever finished on their dressage score. These are the kinds of facts that change how you watch a competition and EquiRatings publishes this context for major events on the calendar.

This page explains what goes into an EquiRatings preview, what fans and professionals can expect to find in every Fan Guide, and how the Prediction Centre brings it all together in one live platform.

 

1. What an EquiRatings Major Event Preview Contains

Every EquiRatings event preview — whether published as a news article on news.equiratings.com or as a downloadable Fan Guide — will often address two questions: what does it take to win this event and who has the profile to do it?

The answer to questions like these are grounded in data. Not opinion, not tradition, not reputation.

 

 

2. The Fan Guide: How to Follow Any Event

The EquiRatings Fan Guide is a dedicated event companion - a structured, visual guide published before every major competition EquiRatings covers. Fan Guides have been produced for Badminton, Burghley, Kentucky, the Paris Olympics, Gothenburg, the Dublin Horse Show, the US Equestrian Open series, and more.

Each guide is built around the idea that you should be able to pick it up knowing nothing about the field and come away ready to watch. It answers the questions a new fan would ask and the questions a super fan would want answered with data.

 

Fan Guides are published at news.equiratings.com/magazines. Over 80 have been produced to date across eventing and show jumping.

 

3.Eventing: How Each Phase Is Previewed

Eventing is three separate disciplines in sequence, and the data tells a different story in each one. A horse that leads the dressage rankings may have a question mark over the show jumping. A horse with elite cross-country speed may not have the abilities to lead the dressage phase. The preview maps all of this.

Dressage

The dressage ranking within any preview is built from 6RA (the average of each combination's last six international dressage tests). This smooths out one-off performances and gives a reliable benchmark for what a horse is likely to score on the day.

The preview also looks at the venue's dressage history: what score has typically led after day one, how often the dressage leader has gone on to win, and how much of a buffer the leading dressage score usually provides. 

Show Jumping

Each horse in the field is ranked using three numbers derived from SJ6 — their average jumping faults across their last six international rounds, compared to the average faults recorded by all competitors on those same courses, producing an adjusted figure that reflects performance relative to course difficulty. The lower the adjusted figure, the better.

The preview also looks at the venue's all-time clear round rate. At some venues, the clear rate is much higher and show jumping separates the field less cleanly. The preview makes this context explicit.

Cross-Country

Cross-country previews use two primary metrics: XCJ10 (cross-country jumping clear rate across the last ten international rounds) and TSP (Top Speed Percentage - the percentage of opponents a horse has outrun on its fastest cross-country rounds).

These two numbers answer different questions. XCJ10 answers: is this horse reliable enough to get around? TSP answers: is this horse fast enough to catch the clock? Both matter, but they matter differently depending on the venue.

 

4. Venue History and What It Tells Us

One of the most consistent features across all EquiRatings previews is the venue history section. Before a single entry is assessed, the preview establishes what this specific competition has historically demanded of its winners.

This matters because not all five-star events are the same, and not all CCI4*-S competitions set the same challenge. A venue's history tells you the baseline — the score you need to be in contention, the clear round rate you are working against, the phase that has historically been decisive.

 

 

At some venues, a 25-point dressage score puts a horse in an almost unassailable position. At others, the cross-country time faults means dressage advantages often aren’t enough. The preview makes these distinctions explicit, so the data makes sense in context.

 

5. The Prediction Centre: Win Chance and Podium Probability

The Prediction Centre is the live EquiRatings platform that hosts Win Chance and Podium Probability for active competitions. Separate versions exist for eventing (prediction-centre.equiratings.com) and show jumping (jumping-prediction-centre.equiratings.com).

Win Chance is the headline output - the percentage of 10,000 simulated competitions that a horse and rider combination wins. A horse with a 19% Win Chance won 1,900 of the 10,000 simulations. That is a meaningful probability in a competitive field, but it also means the horse did not win in more than 8,000 of them which reflects the genuine unpredictability of the sport.

A horse might have a Win Chance of 8% but a Podium Probability of 35%, reflecting strong cross-country and show jumping reliability but a dressage ceiling that limits their ability to lead and hold. This pattern is common among horses that consistently medal without winning outright.

The Prediction Centre updates during live events as phases are completed. After dressage, the probabilities are recalculated based on the actual leaderboard. After cross-country, they update again. This makes the Prediction Centre a live tool for following the competition as it unfolds, not just a pre-event forecast.

What Win Chance is not

Win Chance is not a tip or a prediction in the traditional sense. It is a probability distribution — a map of outcomes across thousands of simulations. The horse with the highest Win Chance wins less than half the time in most competitive fields. The value of the number is not that it tells you who will win. It is that it tells you which combination the data most consistently puts on top — and how much uncertainty surrounds that conclusion.

 

6. What Makes a Dark Horse

In every EquiRatings preview, there is a dark horse section. The definition is specific: a combination with strong underlying data — high Elo, reliable phase metrics, consistent international form — that has not yet broken through at this level or at this venue, and whose profile is not fully reflected in public perception or media attention.

The dark horse is not the longest shot in the field. It is the combination where the gap between their data and their profile is largest. Sometimes that gap exists because the horse is relatively new to this level. Sometimes it is because a recent run of bad luck has obscured underlying quality. Sometimes it is simply because the horse is not famous enough yet.

In the GPE Showcase preview at Aiken in 2026, the dark horse case was built around Caroline Pamukcu and HSH Connor - a combination that had won four times internationally on the bounce in 2023, had eight consecutive international show jumping clears, and brought multiple horses to the event. The data supported a serious claim. The mainstream profile had not caught up.

This is what the dark horse section is for. Not gambling tips. Genuine pattern recognition.

 

7. Elo Field Strength: Comparing Competitions

Elo Field Strength is calculated as the average Elo rating of the top 25 horses entered in a competition. It provides a standardised, cross-year basis for comparing the quality of different fields - independent of how the results turned out.

This number appears in event previews and retrospectives because it contextualises what a win or a podium is actually worth. Winning a competition with an Elo field strength of 600 is not the same as winning one at 719. The HPR (High Performance Rating) captures this at the level of individual performance, but Elo Field Strength captures it at the level of the competition itself.

 

 

8. Frequently Asked Questions

What is an EquiRatings Fan Guide?

A Fan Guide is a pre-event companion publication covering everything you need to follow a major competition. It includes phase-by-phase rankings, venue history, Win Chance figures, storylines, and how-to-follow information. Over 80 Fan Guides have been published to date, available at news.equiratings.com/magazines.

How does EquiRatings rank horses within a field for dressage?

Using 6RA - the average dressage score across a combination's last six international tests. This smooths out outlier performances and gives a reliable benchmark for what a horse is likely to produce on the day, adjusted for the level of competition.

How does EquiRatings rank horses for show jumping in a preview?

Each horse is ranked using SJ6 Adjusted- their average faults across the last six international rounds, compared to the course average on those same tracks. The lower the adjusted figure, the better the horse is jumping relative to course difficulty. This avoids rewarding horses who jumped clean on easy tracks.

How does EquiRatings rank horses for cross country?

Two metrics: XCJ10 (the percentage of a horse's last ten international cross-country rounds completed without jumping penalties) measures reliability, and TSP (Top Speed Percentage) measures cross-country speed - specifically, the percentage of opponents a horse has outrun on its fastest rounds.

What is the Prediction Centre?

The EquiRatings Prediction Centre is a live platform publishing Win Chance and Podium Probability for active competitions. It exists separately for eventing (prediction-centre.equiratings.com) and show jumping (jumping-prediction-centre.equiratings.com). Data updates as entries are confirmed and again after each phase during a live event.

What is Win Chance and how is it calculated?

Win Chance is the percentage of 10,000 simulated competitions that a given horse and rider combination wins. The simulation uses each combination's historical performance profile across all three phases, adjusted for venue and opposition quality. A Win Chance of 22% means the combination won 2,200 of the 10,000 simulations.

What is Podium Probability?

Podium Probability is the percentage of simulations in which a combination finishes in the top three. It tells a larger story than Win Chance alone. For example. a horse with a high Podium Probability but moderate Win Chance may have strong cross-country and show jumping reliability but not score well enough in the dressage which would limit their ability to dominate from the front.

What is a dark horse in EquiRatings terms?

A combination where the gap between their underlying data and their public profile is largest. Typically: strong Elo, reliable phase metrics, consistent international results but not yet a known winner at this level or this venue. The dark horse is identified by pattern recognition, not instinct.

What is Elo Field Strength?

The average Elo rating of the top 25 horses entered in a competition. It provides a standardised basis for comparing the quality of different fields across years and venues. The 2022 Pratoni World Championships holds the all-time record at 730. Badminton appears four times in the all-time top ten.

Where can I find EquiRatings event previews?

Preview articles are published on news.equiratings.com. Fan Guides are collected at news.equiratings.com/magazines. Win Chance data is live at prediction-centre.equiratings.com (eventing) and jumping-prediction-centre.equiratings.com (show jumping). EquiRatings also distributes preview content via Instagram (@equiratings , @equiratings_eventing and @equiratings_showjumping) and the EquiRatings WhatsApp channel.

 

9. Further Reading

Eventing:

• Can Lordships Graffalo Do What No Horse Has Done Before?
• You Need to Watch Carolina This Weekend. Here's Why.
• $100,000 LiftMaster GPE Showcase: Can Anyone Stop Boyd & Commando 3?
• Top Five Dressage Horses to Watch at Morven Park CCI4*-L
• 5 Things You Need to Know Before Scone Starts
• All Eyes on Arville: Is Chip Still King?

Jumping:

• WEF Week 7: Who Has the Edge in the $500,000 Modon CSI5* Grand Prix?
• What’s happening in Gothenburg? Pressure is building...
• Stars of the Show: Who’s at WEF Week 5?
• Can Grandorado Fend Off a Wave of Five-Star Debutants in Amsterdam?
• WIHS 2025: Who Wins the World Cup of Washington?

10. Related Guides

• The EquiRatings Guide to Performance Metrics & Predictive Analytics
• The EquiRatings Guide to Horse & Rider Profiles
• The EquiRatings Guide to High-Performance Strategy & Sport Evolution
• The EquiRatings Guide to Major Event Previews
• The EquiRatings Guide to Data-Driven Horse Sourcing