Lauren Keiffer and Veronica II
American riders have come to the Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials en masse this year and today they made their mark by taking the lead this morning
America’s Lauren Kieffer riding Veronica II, a horse well known for her prowess in this discipline, moved ahead of Michael Jung and La Biosthetique Sam with a score of 37.0 at her Burghley debut
It was a lovely flowing test that demonstrated the mare’s good dressage bloodlines. She is a Dutch-bred by Pacific (a son of the jumping sire Corland) out of a mare by the former Olympic dressage stallion Ferro who was imported to the US by Australian Olympian Scott Keach and sent to Lauren to sell. When Lauren broke her arm she passed the ride to Karen O’Connor, who liked the mare and bought her but after Karen suffered a serious fall, the mare passed back to Lauren
In 2016 the pair finished second to Michael Jung at Kentucky CCI4*, adding just 7.6 time penalties on cross country and one jumping time penalty, but traditionally they have not been the fastest pair on the cross country track.
However Lauren has been addressing this whilst she has been based in England, getting some help from one of the fastest riders around, New Zeland’s Jonelle Price, and Lauren is hoping will give her an advantage on tomorrow’s cross country which she says is ‘big and bad’!
Lauren Keiffer
