The kilts were out in force on the final day at Blair Castle
After the torrential rain of cross country day the sun decided to pop its head out occasionally for the final day at Blair Castle but wellies were very much de rigueur for those attempting to walk around the trade stands for a final fling of shopping.
As on previous days the other arenas were busy from 9am with British Showjumping and Showing classes as the second horse inspection took place for the Longines FEI European Championships in the main arena. There were no big surprises with the German and British horses looking on top form but the popular local rider Wills Oakden had opted to withdraw Greystone Midnight Melody before the inspection started. Two horses were sent to the holding box – Russia’s Nabludatel ridden by Boris Vasilev and Spain’s Mirla CP 27 58 ridden by Albert Hermoso Farras - both opted to withdraw at that point. Russia had already been eliminated from the team competition during cross country but this left Spain, the only country apart from Germany to get all riders home on Saturday, with just three team members
Sadly for Spain, their luck didn’t hold out with Cristina Pinedo Sendagorta being eliminated in the morning session of the show jumping. Cristina’s Helena XII slid into Fence 3, just as Niklas Lindback’s Cendrillon had done a little earlier, and then refused a second time. This oxer fence whose swirly, candy-stick like colours may have produced a strange optical effect for the horses, resulted in elimination of not only Cristina but also the Spanish team. All France and Sweden had to do now was finish with a team and they would qualify for Rio 2016
Bettina Hoy provided the first clear round of the morning with Designer 10 looking fit and well and she was joined by Patrizia Attinger on Raumalpha, Carlos Diaz Fernandez on Junco CP and Merel Blom on her WEG bronze medal winning horse Rumour Has It N.O.P. (where they also jumped a clear round), all putting in clear rounds by the lunch break
The drama of the morning came from Britain’s Nicola Wilson who very nearly fell off at Fence 7 but made a fantastic recovery to stay on board One Two Many and finish with just those four faults.
“Going through my head was ‘Don’t fall off, don’t fall off’, there’s only three of us on the team” said Nicola, who hasn’t had the best of weeks at Blair Castle
Nicola Wilson
Event Director Alec Lochore escorts Her Majesty The Queen
The afternoon session brought royalty to the event and a great deal of excitement as Her Majesty The Queen and Prince Phillip joined the spectators in the main grandstand. The British riders each saluted their monarch and Italy’s Emiliano Portale received a round of applause from the crowd for his impressive salute.
As always for the final 25 combinations the tension steadily mounted; Tim Lips and Keyflow N.O.P. produced the first clear round of the afternoon after the two British girls Holly Woodhead, who led after the first day of dressage and Sarah Bullimore, called up at the last moment, had one and two rails respectively. Oliver Townend restored British pride with a clear round on Fenya’s Elegance, giving him something to smile about today.
They're in! Sweden and France take the two qualifying spots for Rio 2016
The Swedish and French riders had an extra weight on their horses with the hopes of each nation riding on their performance as well as team or individual honours. Both completed a team, qualifying them for Rio but France had much more to celebrate. Thomas Carlile and Sirocco du Gers had one rail down to finish in 24th place, Mathieu Lemoine riding Bart L jumped clear for 16th place and Thibaut Vallette produced a lovely clear round to the joy of the French who had just won the team bronze on 183.70 penalties. Thibaut, who is a Lieutenant Colonel in theFrench army but works for the famous Cadre Noir, admitted that he had never expected to be an individual medallist
“Of course we knew that we had a chance of maybe winning a team medal but I never expected to be in third place individually as it’s the first Championship so I’m really happy about it” said Thibaut “The real target was to qualify France for Rio 2016 and so I’m really proud of being part of the team that did that and, after Karim fell on the cross country we were under team instructions to take all the long options to ensure we finished three riders and I’m really proud of all my colleagues for what we have achieved together.”
Thibaut Vallette and Qing du Briot ENE HN
Thibaut’s horse, the 11 year old Selle Francais gelding Qing du Briot ENE HN now will have a holiday while Thibaut goes back to his duties at the Cadre Noir, training students and performing at the galas then next year he will start to focus on selction for Rio but, he says, that is a long way away!
Pippa Funnell produced a lovely clear round for the British team on her young Sandman 7, as did Kitty King’s Persimmon who was jumping like a stag; Izzy Taylor and KBIS Briarlands Matilda dropped one rail at Fence 8, costing her an individual medal as she dropped down to sixth place but the British team of Pippa, Kitty, Nicola and William had hung on to the silver medal spot ten points clear of the French on 173.30.
Kitty King and Persimmon
Kitty’s clear round put her into fourth place and the best placed British rider, which she admitted wasn’t quite how she had thought things would turn out when she was first selected for the team
“To be honest when I was told that I would be going first for the team, which I knew a while before we came here, I wasn’t imaging getting a top individual spot. I just wanted to go out there and put in a really solid performance for the team and get us off to a good start so I wasn’t really thinking of even being in the top ten. It’s really lovely to finish so well”
Unfortunately her fellow Brits Laura Collett dropped to 13th on Grand Manoeuvre with eight jumping penalties and three time faults while Gemma Tattersall encountered the same problem with Fence 3 as Niklas Lindback and Cristina Pinedo Sendagorta, with Arctic Soul slithering to a halt and demolishing the fence. They regained their composure to jump the rest of the course without any more problems to finish in ninth place.
The dominance of the German riders was made patently clear today with all four of the combinations, Dirk Schrade riding Hop and Skip, Ingrid Klimke riding Horseware Hale Bob, Sandra Auffarth riding Opgun Louvo and Michael Jung on the youngest horse in the competition fischerTakinou, all posting clear show jumping rounds to win the European Championship. Their discard score for this round was that of seventh placed Dirk Schrade – an astonishing feat while Michael and Sandra won individual gold and silver
For Ingrid Klimke it was particularly sweet to be riding her own horse and winning a gold medal at their first Championship together
Michael and fischerTakinou
Michael modestly says that he didn’t give fischerTakinou the best ride today in the showjumping but, despite that, he is once again the individual as well as team European gold medallist and there can be no doubt that it is well deserved
