Hollie, Jessica and Simone Brake records on Horseback

With the flourish of top racing around the world following lock down things are slowly returning to normal with less top races being run as the catch-up has abated somewhat. In dressage, a couple of CDI’s and the first FEI 5 star CSI took place in France for the showjumpers.

Eventing

This weekend saw the ninth running of the Wellington Horse Trials in the UK. It was their first as an International event. There were 55 starters in the CCI 3 star (S) but despite it being their first international event, it was held behind closed doors (not thier fault) even so it was expected that you paid to watch the event on line and they could even be bothered to put up any results. Not a good start!!!! (After reading this, they may have got the results up!!)

Sadly, Chilli Morning – William Fox-Pitt’s Badminton winner of 2015 died last week at the age of 20. He was a stalwart of the Fox-Pitt stables and some say he was the best eventing stallion of all time. He was a regular on the British team in 2013, 2014 and 2016. He won the individual bronze medal at the Malmo European Championships and repeated his feat in the World Equestrian Games in Caen in 2016, but added the team bronze to his tally as well. He will be great missed by Chris Stone, his owner, where he was in retirement at his owner’s farm.

Badminton winner of 2010, Paul Tapner, who had a fall out hacking earlier in August which resulted in a brain bleed and stroke has now left hospital in good spirits and will re-habilitate at the Injured Jockeys Fund’s venue at Oaksey House near Lambourn.

Racing

Hollie Doyle, the inform jockey in the UK broke a record for a female jockey of five wins on the card at Windsor on Saturday including the Group 3 Gallagher Group Winter Stakes riding Extra Exclusive.

In Australia, the Group 1 Magic Millions Memsei Stakes attracted thirteen runners for 3 year olds only over 7 furlongs at the Caulfield racetrack. It was won by Behemoth ridded by Craig Williams and trained by David Jolly.

In Saratoga, there were two Group 1 races, both for 4 year olds and up. The first on dirt was the Forego Stakes over seven furlongs and the second was the Sword Dancer Stakes over 1 ½ miles on the turf. The Forego Stakes was won by appropriately names Win Win Win by ½ a  length trained by Michael Tombretta and the Sword Dancer Stakes was easily won by William Mott trained Channel Maker. The six year old gelding is a Canadian bred horse by English Channel out of a Horse Chestnut mare and his winnings are now very nearly $2 million.

In the UK, the first of three pilots to allow spectators back to watch racing at courses has been approved. The first meeting with spectators will be the Doncaster Ledger Meeting, followed by jumps racing at Warwick and the Cambridgeshire meeting at Newmarket at the end of the month.

Very unexpectedly, Delia Bushell has been suddenly forced to resign as head of the British Jockey Club following allegations that she was a bully to her colleagues, made several racists comments and sharing offensive material. She was in the post for less than a year.

Showjumping

The first major FEI 5 star CSI class was held over the weekend at Grimaud in France with a truly international field of 46 riders from 16 countries. There were 13 clearing the first round and going for the jump off of which only 4 completed the double clear. Brazil’s Marlon Mondolo Zanotelli took the winners spot riding the 11 year old KWPN gelding VDL Edgar M  in 35.33 seconds, nearly a whole second ahead of Emanuele Gaudiano from Italy and Olivier Phillippaerts from Belgium in third.

Dressage

There were two CDIs this weekend, the first in Germany at Donnauschingen and the second at Brno in The Czech Republic. The Grand Prix winner from Australia Simone Pearce riding Destano smashed her record in a Grand Prix for an Australian rider only achieved recently in Austria, winning with 76.261% and 77.894% in the freestyle to music at the Brno venue. She was riding Destano, a 13 year old Hanoverian gelding. At Donnauschingen, Jessica Von Bredow-Werndl riding TSF Delera BB posted their best scores as a partnership in the CDI 4 star. They took the class with 81.809%. The Germans took a clean sweep in the placings with Jessica’s brother Benjamin, riding Famous OLD in second with Fredrik Wandres riding Duke of Britain in third.

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