Rome, Italy – It was another close-call head-on attack by U.S. lady riders in a near-repeat performance that ended with a strong second place finish in Rome, Friday. Together, Beezie Madden, Anne Kursinski, Schuyler Riley and Laura Kraut gave us something to cheer about again—a performance that now puts them in a face-off challenge with Great Britain, as they both share the leading spot in the overall standings on the 2005 Samsung Super League leader board.
The real battle of the day was waged among three star-studded teams: the United States, Great Britain and Germany.
A first place finish was not to be for the United States in this leg of the competition though. Double-clear performances from Britain's Nick Skelton and Michael Whitaker sealed victory at the second leg of the 2005 Samsung Super League series in Rome Friday. In a steely test of nerves the competition went right down to the wire and Whitaker was the super-star of the day. Under tremendous pressure when everything depended on him as last man into the ring, the veteran performer produced a second superb round from Portofino who has found the perfect partner in the Yorkshire-born Englishman whose skills were not found wanting at the most important moment.
Course-designer Marco Cortinovis set a tough track that British Chef d'Equipe described as "perfect" but which Skelton pointed out was “plenty big and technical. I thought the first double would cause more problems than it did but the last line was difficult - there were faults everywhere on the course so the builder did a good job,” he added.
“I found it tough,” Whitaker said, “right from the very first fence, there was nothing easy and after the first round I knew my horse and myself had worked hard - the middle of the treble was big and so was the last - horses were getting tired at the end of the track.”
Cortinovis sent them off over an oxer facing the collecting ring and swung them back over a right-handed vertical then left-handed down the side of the ring over an oxer to a vertical but it was the following double that began to ask the questions.
From here on riders had to commit themselves to a demanding line including a big wall followed by the water-fence and then another vertical followed by a wide oxer - this proved the undoing of many as a strong ride from the wall to the water left a big number of riders struggling for control to the following vertical. Then there was a wide swing to the triple-bar three fences from home which again asked for a major effort and unbalanced some horses ahead of the tricky triple combination. Time and again falling poles on this late section of the track proved very costly indeed.
Towards the end, everything hinged on the final runners.
When Christian Ahlmann (Coster), Marco Kutscher (Cash) and Meredith Michaels-Beerbaum (Checkmate) returned home for the second time all the pressure was piled on their last man Ludger Beerbaum and a big surprise was in store. Ludger cleared the triple-bar three from home but, to the amazement of the spectators, Goldfever ducked out to the right-hand side of the following combination and, after another hesitation, the
German champion had to call it a day. The absence of a score from him in the second round left them with the addition of four from Ahlmann and eight from Kutscher and this gave some leeway to the last two teams.
But Beezie Patton Madden (De Silvio) had a fence down and Anne Kursinski (Roxana 112) lowered two poles so when Schuyler Riley and Ilian matched Meredith's second-round clear then Laura Kraut was the one in the hot seat. If she could steer Miss Independent home clear then the United States would finish with just 12 faults at the end of