Buenos Aires (ARG) 09 October - 12 October 1966

The sixth FEI Jumping World Championship was held in Buenos Aires (ARG) gathering 14 athletes from 8 National Federations.

Two decisions

After the fifth FEI Jumping World Championship held in Venice (ITA) in 1960, the FEI took two important decisions.

The first one was that the World Championships would be held in the even years between the Olympic Games. This timetable is being followed to this day. Nowadays, the FEI World Championships in the Olympic disciplines of Jumping, Dressage, and Eventing kick off the Olympic qualification cycle two years before the Olympic Games.

The second decision was to hold the event outside of Europe for the first time. It was a courageous decision since flying horses to South America in 1966 was quite the adventure. Seven athletes and horses flew from Milan (ITA) to Buenos Aires (ARG).

Another new rule

A new rule the FEI had introduced for this Championship concerned the point system for the final change-of-horse competition. According to this rule, fences down incurred by an athlete with his own horse would be penalised by 125%.

Pierre Jonquères d’Oriola was the only athlete to go clear on his own mount, Pomone B, which secured him the gold medal. Spain’s José Alvarez de Bohórques (Quizas) was in silver, followed by the 1960 champion Raimondo d’Inzeo (Bowjak) of Italy. Future Brazilian great Nelson Pesoa (Huipil), who at the time had already moved to Europe, was fourth.