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Saturday, June 16, 2007

Collecting Gaits Farm/USEF Dressage Festival of Champions

Steffen Peters and Courtney King Tie for the Lead in the Grand Prix

The hunt for the Grand Prix Special honors was fierce late in the afternoon. Three very different horses staked their claim to the honors and in the end, a tie had to be broken between two of them.

Crowd-pleasing Rociero, the only P.R.E. (Pura Reisa Espanola) in the competition, didn't disappoint his fans. In second place coming into the competition the strengths of his test lay in his passage and his changes with rider Kristina Harrison-Naness. Lack of impulsion in the pirouettes cost the pair a couple of points but they marched happily through their test with plenty of charisma. With a score of 70.16% he went to the lead – momentarily.

"I was thrilled with my ride," said Harrison-Naness. "I felt like my horse gave me all he had. I could feel the humidity today, I think the Californian horses breathe a lot harder. He was with me the whole ride. My whole goal here was to be consistent and that we've done."

Harrison-Naness was followed immediately in the ring by Courtney King and the 17-year-old KWPN stallion Idocus. An elegant effort, highlighted by straight 8s on the one-tempi changes and very polished canter work made up for any disappointment from the first day. On the strength of plenty of 8s in the collective marks King slipped into the lead with a score of 71.76%. Idocus had been feeling under the weather yesterday, explaining his unusually score for the consistent campaigner.

"The vets felt he was a little dehydrated," said King. "They did a lot of massage and body work and chiropractic adjustment to relieve what was bothering from breeding. They definitely did a stellar job. Yesterday, try as he might, he just couldn't do it. It was hard, he wasn't himself today but he could do it. I'm hoping tomorrow he feels a little bit better. Yesterday I came out of the ring in tears and I wanted to scratch him out but everyone said let's look at the horse and see if there is something we can relieve and warm him up today and see how he is. It was hard, I was a little apprehensive in the beginning. But I had to put it out of my mind. It was hard and we were both having to work hard but he could do it."

Overnight leader and Olympic medalist Steffen Peters followed King into the ring on Lombardi and used all of his skill to finesse a stellar performance out of the exuberant 16-year-old Holsteiner. Uncharacteristically, the test was marred by a few mistakes and Peters worked hard for each point. The consummate professional, Peters picked up eights and a nine for his riding. He too ended on a score of 71.76%. Using the collective marks to break the tie, Peters won the second portion of the Grand Prix and King ended up second.

"My (collective) score was just one point ahead of Courtney's, a little luck sometimes," said Peters. "At the end of the day it was Brian (O'Connor)'s fault because right when I came in he announced Courtney's score and I like her a lot but when we go down the center line it's competition. When they announced it was a 71 I knew I had to step it up and that's what we did."

After the first two portions of the Grand Prix Peters leads from Harrison-Nanes and Jane Hannigan (who was fourth in the Special).