TOŚKA (KALINA – OLGA)

According to Gustav Rau, after dressage: “A very noble, muscular, elegant mare. When trotting, the hind hooves move erratically. All movements alive. Good transitions.”
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The third horse of our team, Tośka, ridden by Rtm. Kulesza, finished the trial in 20th individual place with 438 penalty points. These included: 138 penalty points from the dressage test, 330 points for the cross-country race (180 points for errors on obstacles and 150 points for exceeding the time due to falls), In the steeplechase the mare managed to make up for a significant number of 30 bonus points . She passed the equestrian competition without any mistakes.

To understand the reasons for Tośka's penalty score, you need to know the mare's character. I talked about Tośka with the captain. Zgorzelski and Lieutenant Mickunas, who had this mare at work. The common dominant of their opinions is that Tośka is one of the exceptionally rare difficult horses in this respect. Extreme nervousness, hypersensitivity manifesting itself in violent and unpredictable reactions - and even retaliation, super-ambition, bordering on a kind of hysteria - cannot, of course, make the rider's work in the championship easier.

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So far I have talked about Tośka's dark sides. Its greatest advantages include inexhaustible energy and wonderful dynamic qualities. After the exhausting cross-country skiing at the Olympics, the mare was fresh and fully ready for a new effort. She proved it the next day in show jumping, which she passed without a mistake. This reservoir of boiling energy is Tośka's most outstanding feature.

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After the appointment of captain Zgorzelski at the end of 1935 to CW Kaw. in Grudziądz, Tośka joins the Olympic preparatory group, where she works in the championship team. After the departure of the captain Zgorzelski, due to poor health, from Grudziądz, this extremely difficult mare is given to Rtm. Kulesza, who in turn, after the International Competition in Warsaw, gives it to Lieutenant Mickunas, who worked on it with excellent results until he left for Berlin.

Lieutenant Mickunas' work on Tośka's dressage contributed many valuable elements, contributing to the mare's calmness and balance. As a result, Tośka is registered for the Olympics as a reserve horse of our team. After Ben-Hur dropped out due to lameness, Tośka was responsible for representing our colors in the fight of nations.

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The Olympic results of our riders exceeded the achievements of our Olympians in other fields of sport, because the path of competition of none of them can match the dramatic tension, the enormity of the three-day physical and nervous effort, the amount of manly courage and the heart to fight that our riders showed on the Olympic track.

They won a valuable jewel in the Olympic competition - the world vice-championship. This is the source of joy and pride - for Polish riders and Polish breeders. The Ministry of Military Affairs and the Polish Riding Association awarded the winners - breeders and riders - honorable decorations as tokens of appreciation and gratitude.

Author: Editorial team of the magazine Rider and Breeder
“Horses at the 1936 Olympics – Tośka” (1936)

Below you will find links to related materials in the Polish Digital Equestrian Library.