Monday, April 4, 2005

Dressage World Cup League Finals at the Festival of the Horse CDI***-W
by Charlene Strickland

Brentina Rocks Burbank

Burbank, California - Debbie McDonald dropped a hint Saturday about her Sunday freestyle, and she and Brentina delivered a dynamite performance. Set to music from Motown, the choreography impressed judges and dazzled the audience in the LA Equestrian Center.

Brentina showed her reliability and accuracy in the movements, as described by judge Hanna Valentine, Denmark: “The transitions are beautiful, piaffe and passage very nice and harmonious and supple. The turning in the piaffe was perfect.”

The degree of difficulty—and McDonald's success in matching Brentina's strides to music like Aretha Franklin's “Respect”--earned her the top score of 77.975. She had only practiced this new freestyle a few times, and debuted it at this US Freestyle Championship and US League Final for the World Cup.

“I was dead nervous when I started,” she said afterwards. “I told Klaus [Balkenhol] I heard his voice many times during my ride: 'You have time, Debbie.' “I tried to compose myself, then I settled into the program and started to have a lot more fun. The first couple movements I was a little bit off. Then I picked it up and I was in sync.”

She added that she did the choreography and suggested the music. Terri Gallo put together the freestyle for Brentina.