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Andrew Hoy and Cheeky Calimbo through the main arena
It was an interesting start to the CCI3* cross country at the Blenheim Palace International Horse Trials for two very experienced riders on their first rides of the day, Andrew Hoy and William Fox-Pitt. Andrew’s Lanfranco decided that he didn’t want to go cross country today and put on an impressive display of rearing before the first fence, at one point looking as if he was about to disappear over the surrounding white rails. Even more impressive was Andrew’s stickability – he calmly sat there as Lanfranco went up in the air until he could get him going forward and over the first fence. With the amount of time it took them to get to the first fence it’s amazing that they only had 37.2 time penalties but they also added an additional 20 penalties to that at a jump that turned out to catch many out, the Hope Valley Wooded Hollow at Fence 20.
Andrew’s second ride and the overnight leader, Cheeky Calimbo was much calmer heading out on course but unfortunately incurred 20 penalties at Fence 23 dropping them down to 29th.
William Fox-Pitt didn’t have the best of runs on his first horse either. William and Seacookie had a run out at Fence 11, a fence which was to cause quite a few problems throughout the day, and William opted to retire Seacookie at that point. With Jock Paget coming in with only 2.4 time penalties on Shady Grey and Phillip Dutton having 3.2 time on Fernhill Cubalawn it looked as if the time would be feasible and Francis Whittington showed that it could be done on his first horse Fernhill Highlight, coming in clear and under time and looking very pleased about it - maybe Francis had taken some lessons in speed from the Aston Martin Works guys yesterday!
There were a few incidents with loose dogs, particularly during the early part of the day; both Emily Gilruth on Watership Down and Millie Dumas on Artistiek had company on course as they were chased by dogs; the commentator exhorted people to keep their dogs on lead but, to be fair, the dogs actually were still on leads – the leads just weren’t attached to a hand on the other end.
William also had a dog accompanying him for a little way on his second horse, Freddie Mac (above). Once again Fence 11 was nearly their undoing as Freddie Mac slipped between the two elements but William sat tight and skidded over the second part by the skin of his pants. It was a great piece of riding resulting in the second double clear of the day, moving them into the lead where they stayed for the rest of the day. It wasn’t even a case of third time lucky for William at this jinxed fence when he also had a problem here with his final horse Fernhill Pimms and once again opted to walk home
Paul Tapner and Up In The Air (above) were held due to a fall on course by Piggy French at the Wooded Hollow Fence 20, another influential combination which posed a problem for 13 horses during the course of the day, probably due to the changes of light going in and out of the wooded area. Unfortunately they picked up 20 penalties - we had a chat with Paul afterwards about what happened and find out more about the various horses he has here at Blenheim
Paul Tapner
Shortly after Paul two young British riders set out on course. 18 year old Emily King had a dream start to this event on Brookleigh but a fall early on at Fence 2 put them out of contention while Jodie Amos jumped a great round on Wise Crack, a horse that is an interesting mix of Arab and Irish Sport Horse. This combination has had a good year so far with placings at Burnham Market, Chatsworth and Bramham putting them towards the top of the Britannia League as the highest placed horse and rider combination at 3* level having not yet competed on a Senior British Team. They finished the day in fifth place
Vittoria Panizzon has had to deal with some misfortune this year but she and Merlot’s Magic (above) made this course look easy. Finishing under the time with a clear jumping round the pair moved into sixth place and Vittoria was very pleased with the small gelding
Francis Whittington jumped clear on his second horse and one of the favourites here, Easy Target, but picked up 1.6 time penalties putting him 0.8 penalties behind William’s leading score of 38. Francis was happy overall but commented that his ride hadn’t been quite as fluent as he would have liked in places, resulting in the time faults
“I’ve got two horses in the top five today and I’m thrilled with that” said Francis “I’m complaining about the time faults on Easy Target but the reality is that, if I’d pulled out the dressage test I should have pulled out yesterday, it wouldn’t be that important” (listen to our interview with Francis yesterday here)
Tim Price and Ringwood Sky Boy
Tim Price has not had the best of runs at the past couple of events but today he put in a strong cross country performance to move from eighth after the dressage into third place with a double clear round on Ringwood Sky Boy who redeemed himself after an early departure on the cross country course at Burghley.
“It’s only been two weeks of bad form but it’s been quite a high impact two weeks” admits Tim who thinks that having a week to focus solely on Ringwood Sky Boy has been the key to today’s success.
“Everything has been about the Worlds. Ringwood Sky Boy was my back up horse for WEG and wasn’t required so he has been the second priority so to speak. Another week with him to get back in tune with him meant we had a much better dressage test, giving us a better footing to begin on, and helped strengthen the partnership”
With five horses withdrawn before the cross country including Tim Boland’s GV Billy Elliott and Emma Dougall’s Belcam Bear, 55 of the 74 combinations that started the CCI3* completed today and eight of these jumped double clear. Tomorrow the CCI3* class completes with the lower placed combinations jumping in the morning and the top 20 later in the afternoon
Full CCI3* cross country results here
