Katherine Erickson, of the Grey Brook Eventing Blog that we often link to on EN, has been kindly sent us a report from her experience at Tattersalls in Ireland over the weekend. Thanks for writing this Kate and thank you for reading.
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I’d always heard that the Irish take their riding across the country pretty seriously. Well, if my time at the Tattersalls Three Day Event just north of Dublin this past weekend taught me one thing, it’s that that reputation is very well founded! I arrived on Friday night in time to take a spin around the CCI*** course, and it was MASSIVE: huge (and extremely prevalent) ditches, beefy tables and hedges, and man-made mounds that broke up the otherwise flat terrain by rearing improbably upwards and then falling viciously away. They say that Ian Stark is the new Frank Weldon, leading the way back to more ‘old-fashioned,’ bold, and attacking styles of courses, and I could definitely see where that reputation comes from. His tracks were certainly not for the faint of heart.
The next morning the cross country started bright and early at 8:30 and ran continuously without a break longer than 20 minutes until nearly 7 that night, making it the longest day of nonstop FEI-level competition I’ve ever seen. The CCI* alone ran for almost five hours, fitting in over 100 riders between the open, junior, and pony divisions. My favorite of these were obviously the ponies, who pinged around the horse-sized CCI* track (with their equally pint-sized jockeys!) and made it look easy.
The corner at 14
The CCI* ran until about 1:30, and then it was time for the big class: the CCI***. I was especially eager to see how fences 13abc and 14, the mound complex, would ride. It involved a big bounce bank up onto the mound, three attacking strides to a huge trakehner (made even more intimidating by the fact that it seemed to suspended in mid-air way up on top of the berm!) then landing sharply downhill in another forward 3 strides to a massive brush corner. It was one of those fences that, when I’d walked it the night before, I knew I was going to have to see to believe.
The riders clearly had been thinking the same thing, because nearly all of the first who attempted it went the long route. Only when it became clear that the time would be hard to make without going straight did people start to risk going straight. It was thrilling to watch the likes of William Fox-Pitt and Polly Stockton blast through the direct route (though not without some defensive riding on both their parts!).
The corner at 7
The other rider frightener of the course was at fence 7, a massive open corner suspended over an equally massive and water-filled ditch. It looked straight out of a thrills ‘n’ spills video from the early 90s. In general it ended up riding pretty well, but did cause one notable crash when Andrew Nicholson’s horse tried to leave a stride out and ended up demolishing the whole thing. Fortunately both horse and rider were fine, but it resulted in a lengthy hold as the jump was reconstructed.
Besides the jumping itself, the entire event was also just superbly run. They had a great team of announcers who I’m assuming had their training in race calling, because they announced all 10+ hours of cross country with the sort of fast-paced, fervent intensity that would have fit in at the Kentucky Derby. They also gasped, clucked, groaned, and cheered as they followed the horses around, and of course used those British/Irish riding phrases that I can’t get enough of like, “She must be over the moon with him” and, “Oh dear! He’s lost all his knitting!”
Show jumping dawned brighter and sunnier than the day before, but also significantly windier and colder. I unfortunately only got to stay for the first few divisions and had to leave before the CCI***, but had the pleasure of watching William Fox-Pitt rack up two thirds of his dominating performance of the weekend. I’d only been able to see him ride in person twice before this weekend, and it’s just impossible to believe how good he is: totally in a league of his own. His one star horse looked a bit wobbly and probably wouldn’t have jumped a clear for a mere mortal jockey, but William made it happen. It’s easy to see how he’s achieved the unbelievable achievement of winning over 40 three days, with three more to add to his tally after this weekend alone.
