Alison Duthie reports from the final day at the HSBC FEI World Cup Eventing Qualifier CIC3*
So near and yet so far ...
Megan Jones and Kirby Park Irish Jester had to be content with second place in the Sydney HSBC CIC3*-W after taking down the second to last fence in the show jumping phase and handing the win to Christopher Burton. It was a well deserved win for Christopher and Holstein Park Leilani who added nothing to their fourth placed dressage score of 46.5.
“Leilani was absolutely fabulous this weekend,” said Christopher “but I did feel sorry for Megan for pulling a rail ... oh well that’s eventing.”
It was still a great result for Megan who in April won the New Zealand leg of the HSBC Eventing World Cup which gave her 71 points on the leader board. A second place at Sydney will add a further 67 points to her tally putting her at the top of the leader board for the moment.
“I will now aim to take Jester to Melbourne Three Day Event and back to Sydney for the final selection trial before WEG,” said Megan.
Lying just behind New Zealand rider Clarke Johnson who took out third place was Sonja Johnson riding Ringwould Jaguar, the horse who partnered her to silver medal success at the Beijing Olympic Games last year. Jag showed off his stock horse skills when the pair took an ‘interesting’ and somewhat wobbly line from fence six to seven in the show jumping phase but he was very neat and cleared the fence easily. However an unlucky tap behind at fence ten saw the pair pick up four penalties which left her in fourth place. Riding her less experienced horse, Parkiarrup Illicit Liaison, Sonja also filled the next place on the leader board when the pair had one rail down finishing fifth. Sonja now plans to stay in NSW for a few weeks before heading to Melbourne.
“ ... but I do have to head home at some point before Melbourne because there are lots of things I need to do on the farm,” said this ever practical sheep farmer.
Stuart Tinney and Vettori were looking very classy in the show jumping phase until he hit the first part of the double, as many riders had done, and then went on to have the last fence down as well. Those eight penalties saw him drop back to sixth.
Mustang, the ride of Emma Scott, was certainly looking well and gave the show jumps plenty of air and it was simply bad luck that they tapped the first part of the double and it fell. However this performance was good enough to actually move them up from tenth after cross country to seventh. Meanwhile Emma’s boss, Shane Rose, jumped a good round with the relatively inexperienced Taurus who just got a little ‘stage fright’ at two fences and had them down finishing eighth.
