Steps taken to unite jousting’s voice and make it a recognised sport
A new association has been set up to promote and organise jousting in the UK and internationally
Steps are being taken to give the sport of jousting a “united voice”, run modern tournaments, raise the sport’s profile and engage new fans and participants.
International jouster Emma Pearn and her team-mate Mike Collin have set up Full Tilt, and are running their first tournament on 12–13 September. This includes a category for new jousters; equestrians who are not from a historical or re-enactment background.
Emma told H&H one of Full Tilt’s long-term aims is to set up a governing body, to share best practice and standardise rules and equipment.
“We’re not there yet but we’re trying to get the rest of the jousting community on board, raising awareness of what we’re looking to do,” she said. “Mike and I don’t have all the answers so we’re looking to make this a collective effort.”
The pair have set up a group for international jousters, trying to co-ordinate events to avoid date clashes and share best practice.
Another main aim is to make the sport accessible to more riders.
“Since jousting’s made its resurgence, people have come almost exclusively from the historical, re-enactment worlds,” she said. “But we’re trying to open avenues for strong riders and try to give them routes in.”
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Emma added that the ambition is for jousting to be a recognised sport, with standards, rules and a welfare focus, as the other disciplines have.
“We want to make it safer, better, more accessible and to do more of it,” she said, adding that anyone new coming into equestrianism, as a participant or spectator, is good for the industry.
She and Mike are also looking into VAR (video assistant referee) technology to support judges and to share top performances. This will be trialled at next month’s tournament; this first one is not open to the public, as details are being ironed out, but attracting audiences for jousting as competition rather than historical display is a big aim.
“We’re trying to show it as more of a modern sport and move away from the history; we’ve taken inspiration from other sports,” she said. “It’s very early days but we’ll hopefully communicate jousting in a different way, make it feel a lot more modern and fresh. It’s getting away from ‘Good knight versus bad knight’ to something that’s a lot more serious, a lot more high octane and hopefully a lot more fun too.”
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Eleanor is an experienced journalist who spent over eight years working for local and national newspapers before joining H&H as news editor in March 2016. Passionate about equine welfare and exposing the truth, Eleanor has reported on all aspects of the industry, from Brexit to anti-bullying campaigns, and from dressage rules to mules. Her sport of choice is showjumping, in which she competes her own horses, and she also enjoys reporting at local jumping shows through to international championships.