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David Hodgson

A recent addition to the Virginia-Maryland Regional College of Veterinary Medicine at Virginia Tech will be spending next summer in China, caring for horses in the 2008 Olympics.

David Hodgson has been selected as one of about 20 official Olympic Committee veterinarians, caring for about 200 horses that will be competing in the games. After a veterinary career that took him from his native Australia to Washington State University and back, David Hodgson and his family relocated to Blacksburg this summer. He heads the Department of Large Animal Clinical Sciences at the vet school.

Hodgson specializes in internal medicine and has a doctorate in equine sports medicine. But he and the other vets at the games will treat a variety of ailments, from leg injuries to coughs and colds commonly suffered by horses after a long trip.

Keeping the horses cool in the heat of the summer in Hong Kong will be another challenge, he said. Because of quarantine restrictions for horses entering mainland China, the equestrian events will be held in Hong Kong, not Beijing. That should benefit the horses, Hodgson said, as air quality problems should not be an issue as some fear it will be in Northern China.

Hodgson has taken two trips to Hong Kong in the past few months and said the venue looks amazing. He has served as a veterinarian in past world championship events as well as at the 2000 Olympics in Sydney. He will spend five weeks in Hong Kong, starting in mid-July when the horses arrive.

Until then he'll be in Blacksburg, his new home. Hodgson admitted that relocating to the New River Valley may seem like an unusual career move for an Aussie with ties to the Pacific Northwest. But Mark Crisman, a colleague of his from Washington State who's now at Tech, encouraged him to make the move for years. Hodgson visited and liked what he saw.

"I told my wife, 'Mark's always been pestering me about Blacksburg. Let's do something different; let's see if there's anything here.' It was really as simple as that."