Marilyn Little Dethrones Michael Jung to Take Kentucky Dressage Lead

Marilyn Little and RF Scandalous. Photo by Leslie Threlkeld.

We said yesterday that Michael Jung’s leading day one dressage score of 27.1 would be beaten on Friday at the Land Rover Kentucky Three-Day Event — the key question was how many horses would ultimately pass fischerRocana FST.

At the conclusion of the dressage phase, only one pair managed to best the three-time winners. Marilyn Little and RF Scandalous now top the leaderboard going into cross country on 24.8, a personal best score at CCI4* level for this pair.

RF Scandalous, a 13-year-old Oldenburg mare (Carry Gold X Richardia, by Lario) owned by Phoebe and Michael Manders and Jacqueline Mars, stayed relaxed in the buzzing Rolex Stadium.

I was excited to go on Friday afternoon. She was very businesslike and gave me a great ride. She was really looking to please and did her job,” Marilyn said.

“I knew that she was capable of putting in a great test today. We’ve been working quite hard with Bo Jenå, who is the chef d’equipe for the Swedish dressage team, over the past year and a half. I think it’s been steadily improving. I haven’t competed her so much because we’ve been focused on the training, and I thought if she put in her personal best she could be on top today.”

Michael Jung and fischerRocana FST, a 13-year-old German Sport Horse (Ituango xx X Rose II, by Carismo) owned by Brigitte and Joachim Jung, now sit in second place on 27.1.

As for how it feels to be sitting ahead of the king and queen of Kentucky, Marilyn said: “Those feelings will come and go I’m sure, so I’m going to enjoy this very moment.”

Chris Burton and Nobilis 18. Photo by Leslie Threlkeld.

Chris Burton and Nobilis 18, an 11-year-old Hanoverian (Nobre xx X Lilli, by Lemon xx) owned by Sue Lawson and Carolyn Townsend, sit third on 27.9.

“He stayed lovely and relaxed,” Chris said. “Of course, there can always be things that I wish I could do better, but I’m really happy with the horse, because with horses we know that things can always be worse.” (No truer words have ever been spoken.)

This is Burto’s first time being back at Kentucky since he represented Australia at the 2010 World Equestrian Games, and he said he is delighted to be back in the Bluegrass State.

“It’s a really beautiful track and it’s a beautiful place,” he said. “I walked the course yesterday on my own. I had a nice time out there and I was thinking, ‘This is one of the best courses in the world, isn’t it?’ It’s absolutely beautiful.”

Kim Severson and Cooley Cross Border. Photo by Leslie Threlkeld.

We have two Americans in the top five after dressage, with Kim Severson and Cooley Cross Border, an 11-year-old Irish Sport Horse (Diamond Roller X Whos Diaz, by Osilvis) owned by the Cross Syndicate, sitting in fourth place on 28.3.

Oliver Townend has both of his rides in the top 10 after dressage. Cooley Master Class, a 13-year-old Irish Sport Horse (Ramiro B X The Swallow, by Master Imp) owned by Angela Hislop, sits fifth on 28.7. MHS King Joules, a 13-year-old Irish Sport Horse (Ghareeb X Gowran Lady, by Cavalier Royal), scored 31.3 for eighth place.

As for how Diarm Byrne’s prediction that fischerRocana would be the only Thursday dressage performer still in the top 10 at the conclusion of dressage today, he very nearly called it bang on. Boyd Martin and Tsetserleg are the only other pair still holding on to a spot in the top 10. The 11-year-old Trakehner (Windfall X Thabana, by Buddenbrock) owned by Christine Turner now sits sixth on 31.2 in his CCI4* debut.

Lauren Kieffer and Jacqueline Mars’ Vermiculus, an 11-year-old Anglo Arabian and full brother to her first four-star partner Snooze Alarm, scored 31.2 to tie for equal sixth place.

Lynn Symansky and Donner. Photo by Leslie Threlkeld.

Lynn Symansky and The Donner Syndicate’s Donner, a 15-year-old Thoroughbred (Gorky Park X Smart Jane, by Smarten), very nearly caught his personal best at CCI4* level, scoring 31.3 to tie for eighth place.

Colleen Rutledge and her homebred Covert Rights, an 11-year-old Thoroughbred/Clydesdale (BFF Incognito X Let’s Get It Right, by Covert Operation) round out the top 10 on 24.8.

How the Numbers Played Out

It was not an easy day in the sandbox for a number of combinations, with the ground jury of Christian Landolt, Sue Baxter and Jane Hamlin scoring consistently tough across the board. EN’s data analyst and stats wizard Maggie Deatrick crunched the numbers, and the judges seemed less inclined to be generous with the pairs predicted to deliver the best tests. For horses expected to score in the 20s, as a group they were +2.55% above expected. Expected 30-35 was +2.21%, 35-40 was +1.57% and 40s scored +1.17%.

The final session of dressage was scored +2.56% above expected averages for these horses and riders. The eight sessions across both days of dressage were scored +1.38, +1.93, +1.32, +2.22, +2.35, +2.58, +1.52, +2.65. There was a maximum of 1.33% between the hardest and softest scored sessions, which indicates that this ground jury was consistent in how they marked across both days. 

Each of the judges on average consistently agreed with the other two: Sue Baxter varied by 1.57% from the other two, Christian Landolt 1.29%, and Jane Hamlin 1.49%. The biggest disagreement of the competition was on Wembley, where Jane Hamlin scored him 7.25% above the average of the other two judges. No other disagreement versus the other two judge average was more than 5%.

All to Play For Tomorrow

While Derek di Grazia’s course is expected to shake up the leaderboard tomorrow, the fact that we have a clear forecast means we should see more pairs jumping clear and making the time than we have in the last three years, all of which had rain on cross country day.

RF Scandalous completed her first CCI4* at Luhmühlen last year with 6.8 time penalties on a day when more than half the field made the optimum time, so there is a question mark surrounding her speed.

“Scandalous is a great cross country horse — she’s very courageous,” Marilyn said. “She’s got nice technical ability, good footwork, plenty of scope. The footing is nice. I’m looking forward to a nice ride out there. There’s certainly a number of questions, but everything is very fairly presented, so I think that horses that are well prepared should continue gaining confidence as they course goes on, and those that maybe aren’t having quite the best day might find out early on that it’s not meant to be.”

Michael Jung and fischerRocana FST made the optimum time here in 2015, and added 0.8 time penalties in 2016 and 1.6 time penalties in 2017. In short, they are a very speedy pair around Kentucky regardless of the conditions.

“I hope we can enjoy it because everything is perfectly prepared,” Michael said. “We have super ground and super weather for tomorrow. We have a really, really good course. It’s a tough course but a really nice build with many options.

“I try to go fast and clear — I’ll try for sure, but in the end we get the info from the horse from the warm up and from fences two to three, we go step by step through the course. Then we have to be open in our mind which plan we go — if we take an alternate jump if we have to go slow because also in the end we have tough combinations, we need a lot of power in the horse for the end, so we have to take care that we start not too fast.”

Click here for a fence-by-fence preview of the course. Based on the dry forecast and perfect going, EN’s data analyst Maggie Deatrick is predicting that 22.8% of the field will make the optimum time of 11 minutes, 3 seconds, so we are looking at 10 or 11 horses to beat the clock.

Only 22.4 penalties separate the leader from the last horse in the field. The removal of the dressage coefficient means scores are much more tightly bunched than we typically see, and every second of time added tomorrow will prove all the more costly.

Cross country starts at 11 a.m. EST/4 p.m. BST and will stream live on USEF Network. If you can’t watch, be sure to follow along here on EN in our open thread or on Twitter. Click here to catch up on all of EN’s coverage from #LRK3DE. Go Eventing.

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