Nicolas Wettstein and Onzieme Framoni
It was a very close thing at the Stuttgart German Masters when just a 34 hundredths of a second deficit left the three-time Olympic Champion Michael Jung in second place, as last year, in the Prize of the Firma WALTER Solar late on Wednesday evening.
As a result, the 34-year old local hero once again missed out on winning his eighth indoor eventing class on the first day of the 32nd Stuttgart German Masters International Horse Show. Victory went to Basle-born Nicolas Wettstein who rides for Ecuador.
Riding in the sold-out Hanns-Martin-Schleyer-Halle on the 14 year old gelding Onzieme Framoni, Wettstein was the third of the 24 riders to go and he attacked the course right from the start before crossing the line in a highly impressive 87.79 seconds. Crowd favourite “Michi” Jung got his 11 year old mare fischerRocana FST to give everything she had but it was not quite enough. His time of 88.13 seconds bettered all his rivals bar one.
In third place was Germany’s Ingrid Klimke. The team Olympic silver medal winner in Rio saddled her Trakehner gelding Parmenides and stopped the clock in 89.01 seconds. A little more than a second down was last year’s winner Sidney Dufresne (France) and the 17 year old grey gelding Looping de Buissy (90.15) followed by the team Olympic champion Karim Laghouag with the 13 year old mare Pegase du Tuc (91.49).
A highly impressive sixth place was the reward for the 15 year old German Calvin Böckmann in the saddle on Camissa Nera. The pony European Championships bronze medal winner and his mare of the same age completed the course in 94.39 seconds.
