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Donna Smith and Varadero
Donna Smith was knocking on the door of a win at 2* level at Puhinui International Horse Trials throughout the event and on the final day she just missed out with Mr Hokey Pokey finishing second. However she made up for it by moving up the leader board with a stylish clear round on Brooke Campbell’s 12 year old black gelding Varadero to win the Veterinary Associates’ CCI1*.
Donna and Varadero started the event with a good dressage test to place eighth in the very large field of entries and a double clear on cross country moved them up to seventh place. As the show jumping phase on Sunday progressed it was clear that this was a tricky course as clear rounds were few and far between, with the wavy planks to liverpool line proving particularly challenging for many.
Heelan Tompkins’ Snow Leopard and Christen Lane’s Henton Faberge were the only ones to produce clear rounds before Donna and Varadero entered the arena, moving them up from 19th to 11th and 16th to 6th respectively as a reward for their lovely rides
Donna’s clear round certainly put pressure on the six riders above her. Emily Cammock had already jumped out of order on the third placed Ngahiwi Frostie and picked up four penalties, leaving her in second place at the end of the competition and Dannie Lodder on Call Me Al and Stephanie Vervoort riding X-Factor also both had one rail down.
Christen Lane couldn’t reproduce her first clear round and had eight faults on Kinnordy Galilee and poor Nick Brooks, in second place going into the show jumping, had a round he would probably rather forget on Lexington, who had been so impressive in this competition to that point, dropping them all the way from second place to 15th.
Emily Cammock and Cavorts
The final competitor Emily Cammock entered the arena in the lead on the eight year old chestnut gelding Cavorts but two rails, at the dreaded liverpool and the final part of the triple combination, dropped them into third place behind her grey horse in second to give Donna the win.
It was a family win for the owners of Varadero, Brooke Campbell, who normally competes the horse and her mum who rides the horse during the week - stay tuned for more about the Campbell family’s horses coming up in a video interview with Chanel Campbell soon
Lucy Turner (left) was first and second on the CCI1*Junrio podium with Elizabeth Wylaars in third place
Following straight on from the Open CCI1*, 16 year old Lucy Turner dominated the final phase of the Devi Heating Systems CCI1* Junior class with her two horses Carbon and Tallyho Mystic finishing first and second.
Lucy and the pint sized pony Tallyho Mystic, eighth after the dressage and fourth after the cross country, are no strangers to the show jumping arena so it was not surprising when they jumped a beautiful clear round to leave them on a score of 56. Sophie Alexander and the grey Saltador also jumped a very classy round but Elise Power’s Chocolate Liqueur was not having a bar of the liverpool fence and, having adamantly refused twice, was sadly eliminated.
Fleur Rohleder riding The Alchemist had two down to finish in fourth place while four faults for Elizabeth Wylaars on Waoira Ruby meant that Tallyho Mystic sneaked just in front of them. Lucy had a few penalties in hand over her second placed horse and she used four of them when one rail fell but they finished on 53.3, giving them a very solid win as well as second place
"Carbon did an awesome dressage test this week” said Lucy when we spoke to her afterwards (full interview and more videos of Lucy’s horses coming up soon) “Then he did a really good round cross country but I stuffed him up a couple of times in the show jumping and he saved my butt!”
Lucy and Carbon on the victory lap
