Last year Tonimbuk Horse Trials was hit by the mother of all hail storms. This year Victoria has been inundated by rain and floods but the Tonimbuk Equestrian Centre, one hour south east of Melbourne in the Gippsland countryside escaped the rain until the very final hours of the event. Then it poured! Luckily the equestrian centre boasts two large indoor arenas as well as two huge outdoor arenas so although the CIC*** riders were drenched during their outdoor warm-up, the actual show jumping phase was held in the main indoor arena. As the riders were not riding in the usual reverse order, it was a while before we knew the outcome of the CIC*** class but it was local rider Emily Anker riding Balmoral Cavalier who clinched the deal ahead of Megan Jones on Kirby Park Allofasudden and Emma Scott on the super talented jumper Jenbern Monyana.
Until the last minute torrential rain, the event had enjoyed a lovely two days of sunny, if slightly muggy, weather. Hundreds of riders participated in classes from Introductory to CIC*** and the event attracts riders from all over Victoria as well as interstate. I spent a happy half hour in the shade of some trees watching a few riders in the Pakenham Produce Preliminary C class tackle the water fence on the cross country course. Grey horses seemed to predominate in the early part of the class and most popped through making it look easy, including Vaughan Ellis on Jupiter Mio who finished third in this class. This lovely grey is a full brother to the Four Star event horse Pluto Mio owned by John Pittard.
John also owns the beautiful black mare Anna Perna (a half sister to Pluto Mio) who was also in this class ridden by well known local rider Ebony Tucker. Ebony has produced some very classy horses including Shane Rose’s Olympic mount All Luck but today was not Ebony’s lucky day. The mare was going really well but took a large leap off the edge of the water jump to land on all four legs and catapulted poor Ebony into the water. After a few minutes recovery time, Ebony headed off to ride her other horses and try to get the water out of her nose!
Another Ebony fared a little better. Ebony Toole, who won last year’s CCI*Junior at Melbourne International Three Day Event was riding a very impressive seven year thoroughbred, Game Plan. A little hesitant into the water, he then hit his stride and ate up the ground as he galloped away from the water complex. In second place after the dressage, Ebony was hoping for a good cross country as the horse had had a fall at Camperdown and she has high hopes of him qualifying for the One Star at this year’s Melbourne 3DE if he regains his confidence. He certainly looked fine to me and indeed ended up winning the Preliminary Section C!
We don’t often see her in the lower classes in Victoria but Olympic silver medallist Megan Jones had made the journey from Adelaide with a truck full of horses. Kirby Park Allofasudden (Floyd) had a good run throughout the event – leading the CIC*** after the dressage, a beautiful clear showjumping round but was just pipped at the post by Emily Anker. Megan had a very busy day riding seven horses – some at their very first event and was really pleased with the way they all went. Kirby Park Irish Apollo had his first taste of competition in the Introductory C, finishing fifth and Megan said he just popped around it as if he had been doing all of his life! As well as Megan’s second place in the CIC***, she picked up fifth in the CIC** on Westbury Park Irish Grove, fourth in the Pre-Novice B on Kirby Park Irish Empress, equal second in the Introductory A on Kirby Park Irish Friday and fifth in the Introductory C on Kirby Park Irish Apollo. There were several other horses with the Kirby Park prefix going around so it seems that the Kirby Park breeding programme, managed by Megan’s mum Margaret, is going from strength to strength.
Another rider featured in An Eventful Life, Emma Scott had also made the trip to Victoria for the event. Third in the CIC*** with Jenbern Monyana, Emma was also riding a young thoroughbred called Yell in the Pre-Novice (I must ask how he got his name!). The seven year old Jenbern Monyana looked spectacular in the showjumping to produce a lovely clear round and looks like being a real star. Monyana and Emma will be heading to Albury next, then the World Cup at Sydney. By the time of the Eventing Equestriad at Camden, Emma hopes to be competing both Monyana and her top horse Mustang who has been out through injury for a while. Hopefully Mustang will also be competing at Melbourne 3DE and it will be great to see this wonderful scopey chestnut horse back on form.
Hamish Cargill, well-known as part of the popular roving reporter duo Hamish & Dave was fourth, Emily was fifth on her other horse Keniski (a very good day at the office for Emily – husband Will Enzinger also had a busy day equalling Megan’s seven rides in one event!) and Australian eventing selector and popular local rider Seamus Marwood sixth on Wild Oats (who produced a very good showjumping round). Your roving reporter, Debbie Higgs and photograher Toni-anne Collins like their sleep too much to get up early and so missed the cross country action in the One and Two Star classes (lazy bloggers!). Local top gun rider Katja Weimann had a great weekend in these classes with her home bred horses BP Cosmopolitan winning the CIC** and BP Valentina winning the CIC*. Despite the torrential rain at the end, it was a very good event. Can’t wait to see what the weather does next year! Placing results can be found on our Facebook page at http://www.facebook.com/AnEventfulLife plus lots more photos on the Tonimbuk Photo Album and video from cross country day. [gallery order="DESC"]
