Kaitlin Campbell on Rocky W

Devon, PA - This evening's open jumper class was the Idle Dice Open Jumper Stakes class. The class was named after famed jumper horse Idle Dice.  Idle Dice was originally bred as a thoroughbred race horse, but he was discovered and retrained by Bernie Traurig who showed him as a hunter. He was later purchased by Harry Gill and shown as a jumper by Rodney Jenkins. Idle Dice won over $400,000 in his career (an amount that would triple if adjusted to the value of today's prize money).

Although there will never be another horse like Idle Dice, some of his legacy lives on in the entries in today's class. The fences were high and airy.  A particularly difficult triple combination built of blue and white poles angled slightly against the blue grandstands, tricking the eye. The class began with a spate of four-fault rides. On the handsome gray Uraguay, Todd Minikus broke the trend finishing clear. The crowd thought a second rider had gone clear until the scoreboard delivered the bad news that Callie Smith on Captain Krutzman had a single time fault. And then there were two clear when Beezie Madden added Vanilla to the list of clear rounds. Kevin Babington made it three clears with Shorapur, Shorapur's tail flagging with excitement over each jump. Margie Engel made her round on Royce count, going clear with seven left to ride. Laura Chapot joined the list of clears on Quointreau un Prince. Kaitlin Campbell and Rocky W joined the list with a clear, fast ride. Next to go clear was Angel Karolyi on Amigo. The final rider of the first round was Thaisa Erwin on Matilda but last was not least and she too went clear rounding the field of jump off horses to 8.

Pathfinder for the jumpoff was Minikus who lowered one rail for four faults in 39.55 seconds. Madden was in next. Her tight rollback to the Wells Fargo shaved time but she had the final fence down in 43.162 seconds. Next in was Babington who also had four faults with a slower time of 44.209. Engel then showed how it could be done, going clear in 41.989 seconds. She then watched to see if that time would stand. Next to ride was Chapot who also went clear, stopping the clock on 42.511-just short of Engel's time. Campbell was the next to challenge Engel's time. She took an inside turn that no one else had attempted and was the new leader by a hair with a time of 41.274 seconds. Karolyi was up next but an early rail made it clear Amigo would not finish on top. The clock stopped on 40.476 seconds. Then there was one to go, and it was all up to Erwin and Matilda-but another early rail and a second rail on top meant Campbell had held on and it was Rocky W who lead the victory gallop. In second was Royce and in third was Quointreau un Prince.