Puhinui Reserve near Auckland, venue of the International 3 Day Event, overlooks the Manukau Harbour
According to the Lonely Planet travel guide, Auckland is “New Zealand’s biggest and most cosmopolitan city” with plenty to do and see, saying that
“New restaurant areas continue to emerge, often repurposing heritage buildings and precincts, while the funky City Works Depot adds a hip edge to Auckland’s culinary scene with craft beer and food-truck dining. The extensive refurbishment of the Auckland Art Gallery now includes a stunning glass-and-timber atrium. Venturing outdoors, check out the Wynyard Quarter for front-row views of raffish fishing boats and ritzy super-yachts”
It sounds pretty good, however they fail to mention one of the most important things as it is also the host city of the Puhinui International 3 Day Event from 6th – 8th December.
Although not quite as centrally located as the Australian International 3 Day Event, which runs right through the city of Adelaide, the Puhinui International 3 Day Event takes place very close to the city in the Puhinui Reserve, Manukau, only 20 minutes from Auckland airport. Indeed the airport was a sponsor in the early days of the event when event's popularity also coincided with the rise of New Zealand riders such as Mark Todd, Blyth Tait, Andrew Nicholson and Vaughan Jefferis on the world stage
Heelan Tompkins riding Cortaflex Ski Whistler in 2012
The sponsor may have changed but these top riders are still inspiring the eventing world. This year Honda New Zealand is the sponsor of the CCI3* class (let’s hope they do a victory lap in a car) and guess who is dropping by to say hello? Yes, we’ll be seeing Andrew Nicholson and Blyth Tait along with Joe Meyer visiting from his Florida base and past Puhinui winner Lizzie Brown, fresh from her win at Boekelo.
We're hoping to bring you some great rider interviews as well as our 4* reports every day, Libby’s fabulous photo galleries and we’ll have our cameras trained on the cross country to capture every rider over almost every fence. As usual we’ll be showing footage of the winners of each class on the website and videos will be available for riders to purchase but we’re also delighted to be contributing footage to Sky TV and NZ Country TV who will both be creating programmes about the event (see below for SKY NZ programme times)
This year sees some well-known names contesting the top class, the Honda New Zealand CCI3*, including 2013 NZ Eventer of the Year Simon Grieve riding Fletch.com, who we last met in Sydney at the Trans-Tasman, Angela Lloyd and Song who recently won the CIC3* at the RD1 National One Day Event Championships and local rider Dannie Lodder on Moochi, winners of the CCI3* at Kihikihi this year.
Winners at Kihikihi, Dannie Lodder and Moochi
Matthew Grayling is riding Henton Executive in this class and will also be competing against his daughter Charlotte in the CNC*. It is interesting how many of our top riders around the world are having to look over their shoulder as their children start to compete against them and we hope to find out more about how this father and daughter cope in a competitive environment.
Talking of daughters, Amanda Pottinger, daughter of Olympic bronze medallist Tinks Pottinger will be competing in the CCI2* which has 34 entries. Another well-known name in this class is Clarke Johnstone, a member of the bronze medal-winning New Zealand team at the 2010 World Equestrian Games, who will be riding the in-form Leo Degas, a horse usually ridden by Sam. Annabel Wigley, Heelan Tomkins, Tayla Mason and Samantha Felton are all familiar names to us but it will be good to see them in action ‘in the flesh’.
Donna Smith and Balmoral Sensation led the 3* after dressage last year
Donna Smith is one we have seen in action recently at the Australian International 3 Day Event where she just had one horse, Balmoral Tangalooma but she will be a busy lady at Puhinui with four horses in the Veterinary Associates CCI1* and Balmoral Sensation in the CCI2*. Last year Donna had a cracker of a fall on cross country from this handsome grey horse when they were leading after the dressage but she still finished second in the CCI3* riding Just Chocolate behind the winner Ashleigh Mckinstry.
Tich Massey’s cross country certainly took its toll last year with the top three riders after dressage being eliminated on course in the CCI3*. New Zealand is blessed with talented international course designers such as John Nicholson and Tich, who recently designed the new Tamworth course at AELEC, and we look forward to seeing what challenges there are on course this year (hopefully with Andrew Nicholson giving us some pointers on his cross country walk)
Tich Massey has been busy in the past few days Photo: Jane Thompson
As well as the top classes, there will be plenty of competition in the Horse & Pony CCN105, Fiber Fresh/Prestige CNC105 and Hunter Derby classes for all ages.
This close to Christmas it will be fun to take a tour around the trade stands and do some shopping (although, with only 4kgs of luggage after packing the camera equipment, bringing it back to Australia may be a problem) and you can be sure that the camera boys will be checking out Chilanga Banda Mexican Food stall and Fritz's award winning bratwurst sausages. The Danish Delight Ice Cream made on-site will get our professional tasting (the weather forecast is for warm weather with rain/showers, so it may be ice cream tasting under a brolly) and of course, every event is judged by the quality of its coffee so watch out The Coffee Guy.
So, get ready for a big few days of eventing Kiwi style. Our 4* member coverage starts on Thursday 5th and we’ll be bringing you the full flavour of Puhinui International 3 Day Event with all the action as it happens. In the meantime, check out some YouTube cross country action from last year
You will be able to see the programme aired on 13 December 2013 18:30 SKY Sport 2, Saturday 14 December 2013 06:00 SKY Sport 2, Saturday 14 December 2013 17:00 SKY Sport 3, Monday 16 December 2013 18:00 SKY Sport 1
