Checking out the spooky arena entrance is all part of the familiarisation
The dressage coach for the Australian eventing team, Gareth Hughes has had a great start to the test event for dressage in the new d’Ornano stadium in Caen.
Gareth, who was born in Britain but spent many years based in Australia, is well known in Australian eventing circles as the dressage coach for the Australian eventing team
Yesterday he had a great start to a potential campaign for the 2014 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games as he pipped his compatriot Carl Hester at the post as the second last rider to compete in the Grand Prix test event, winning on DV Stenkjers Nadonna with a total of 72.757%.
Carl had led for most of the competition riding Nip Tuck with a score of 72.343% and Gareth was delighted to win ‘gold’ on the sensitive mare
Gareth sees the competition as a perfect way to prepare the mare for possible selection, enabling her to become accustomed to the arena, including the tunnel that leads from the warm-up to the arena. This is something that the test event riders for eventing were unable to experience last year as the d’Ornano stadium was not ready at that point and an alternative show jumping venue was found
Grand Prix Dressage scores here
Read our coverage of the 2013 WEG Eventing test event here
