The American Competitive Trail Horse Association (ACTHA) made horse riding history on June 13 with the first-ever Guinness World Records achievement for the Largest Trail Riding Competition. A total of 984 riders participated in the record-breaking achievement that successfully raised more than $69,000 for horse rescue programs across the nation.

On the day of the event, riders gathered in 24 states to compete in local trail rides organized by ACTHA for the official Guinness World Records attempt. Riders competed on six-mile trails composed of safe, fun, and natural trail obstacles and were observed by professional judges. In addition to the riding participants, over 622 volunteers across the nation pitched in to make the day's events possible.

"Every volunteer on this monumental effort will have a special place in our hearts and the hearts of the noble horse and equines everywhere," said Tom Scrima, general manager of ACTHA. "We asked ourselves, 'How can we make a bigger impact?' Our goal is to create enough jobs for the American horses in the next three years so that the entire slaughter issue will be a non-issue'"

To qualify for the record, the guidelines stipulated that the competitive trail ride would have a minimum of 250 riders competing at no less than 10 venues with a minimum of 25 riders per site. For this attempt, only trail rides sanctioned by ACTHA were counted. Each trail ride had several divisions with one overall winner for each competition