Dressage

The prestigious Palm Beach Dressage Derby got underway on Thursday, March 4th with some of the nation’s top riders competing in Loxahatchee, FL. Tina Konyot and her Danish Warmblood Calecto V triumphed over the field of elite horse and rider combinations in both the Grand Prix and Grand Prix Special. In the Grand Prix Freestyle Mikala Gundersen and Leonberg put in a winning performance with a score of 72.250%; Canadian Jacqueline Brooks was second with Balmoral.

For complete results please visit http://www.pbderby.com/results-derby.html.

Endurance

Goethe Forest, near Williston, FL was the scene of the Fun in the Sun Endurance Festival and CEI event. Riders competed over three days at five distances. In the CEI3* 160km distance Meg Sleeper and Syrocco Reveille nosed out Kathy Brunjes and Theatric to win by just two seconds with a time of seven hours and 44 minutes. Sleeper and Brunjes set the pace for a competitive field that included all top 10 averaging speeds over 17 kilometers per hour.


Eventing

At the Red Hills International CIC3*-W in Tallahassee, FL Mara Dean posted the first winning score on the HSBC FEI World Cup™ Eventing leader board. Dean rode her veteran Nicki Henley, who has made an inspiring comeback after an injury at the 2007 Pan American Games. Leading after dressage and incurring only 9.2 penalties on the cross country, Dean was able to hold onto the lead after Phillip Dutton and Truluck had five time faults in the show jumping. Will Coleman and Nevada Bay finished just behind Dutton to place third.

For a full event re-cap please visit http://www.usef.org/_IFrames/newsdisplay/viewPR.aspx?id=5437.

For full results please visit http://www.evententries.com/livescoring/14564.html

Jumping

After nine days of fierce competition over five rounds of the USEF Selection Trials for the US Show Jumping Team, 15 horse/rider combinations were named to the Show Jumping Long List for the 2010 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games. The Jumping was impressive and Richard Spooner and Cristallo lead the Trials after four rounds, putting in one spectacular effort after another, but in the end it was Nicole Shahinian-Simpson and Tristan who stylishly topped the standings with just nine faults over Spooner who settled for second.

Twenty-two combinations remained in the final Trial on Sunday which took place as part of the $150,000 CN US Open at the FTI Winter Equestrian Festival at the Palm Beach International Equestrian Center. Laura Kraut and Cedric, who had been named to the Long List after the second Trial, blazed through the jump-off to take home the win over Beezie Madden and Danny Boy by just 1/10th of a second.

For the complete long list please see: USEF Names Horse/Rider Combinations to Show Jumping Long List

For final standings and all the information, please visit: http://www.usef.org/_IFrames/breedsDisciplines/discipline/alljumping/sjSelectionTrials.aspx
and
http://www.clubequestrian.com/coverage/weg_jumping_trial.aspx


Reining

The Cowboy Capital Reining CRI1* and 2* in Stephenville, TX played host to two of the last four qualifying competitions for the USEF Selection Trial for the Adequan US Reining Team for the 2010 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games to be held in July. On Thursday, Brian Bell and Ruffle Me Up (owned by Greg Hill) took top honors in the CRI2*. Tom McCutcheon aboard Chexy Dun It (owned by Turnabout Farm) was a close second.

In the CRI1* held Sunday, it was the international riders that dazzled. Marco Ricotta of Italy and I Spin For Chics owned by McQuay Stables and Brad Giesbrecht of Canada riding Pop Top Whiz owned by Rosanne Sternberg bested the competition with a tie score of 220.

Information is available here: http://www.lonestararena.com/storm.cfm?funnelaction=1184.

Other

The USEF would like to extend best wishes and thoughts to USEF High Performance riders Jan Byyny and Courtney King-Dye. Both of these riders were involved in recent accidents and the entire equestrian community has rallied around them.

To follow Courtney’s progress, please visit her website: http://www.courtneykingdressage.com. For updates on Jan Byyny please see: http://www.surefireeventing.com/news.aspx.

For more information about the U.S. High Performance programs see: www.usef.org/_IFrames/breedsDisciplines/discipline/international.aspx.

The U.S. will send teams in eight different disciplines to the 2010 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games in Lexington, KY, in September of 2010. Watch this space for information about the best in the U.S. on the road to Kentucky.

ENDS

For more information or to submit High Performance news, please e-mail: [email protected].