It seems strange posting a morning dressage recap at night here in North America, but the time difference creates such a circumstance for our Adelaide CCI4* coverage. Here are the Friday morning dressage notes from Adelaide, sent from Australian John Lechner, aka Eventing Safety John, of the Eventing Safety blog. I feel like one of us should pick a name other than ‘John’ to go by this weekend, but I haven’t had any great ideas so far. From one John to another, thanks for writing this.
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Bounce of Ducks with one stride and drop into the water
From Eventing Safety John:
Today marked the start of the 2010 Australian International Three Day Event and from now on I will simply be calling it Adelaide. 23 combinations will start the 4* competition in amazing surroundings. Entries this year may have suffered given the proximity to WEG, however there is a very strong field and the competition will be fierce.
One of the few criticisms able to be leveled at Adelaide is the field is very small for a four star, well is it? Personally I don’t think so.
There are perhaps 30-35 four star combinations in Australia at the moment. Four of those went to WEG, another 5 were prepped for WEG and for various reasons are not running this weekend. So by my calculations that makes at least 32 four star combinations currently in Australia.
So yes, this year’s Adelaide may be missing most of our best combinations but the same could be said for Burghley, Pau & Luhmuhlen this year.
The real question – Is winning Adelaide less of an achievement than winning any of the other four stars.
Well, yes and no.
Lets start with the yes, Adelaide for the most part usually has only Aussie and a couple of Kiwi horses running. So why does the USEA/USEF, or any other federation, not offer grants to send some combinations to run? You need to ask that question.
Yes, it is a long way, tough on the horse and rider, however Adelaide is a world class competition, there should be more international combinations here.
Can you compare it to Badminton or Burghley, no, but even Rolex comes in at number 3 after the big two. Don’t get me wrong I love Rolex and it does attract a variety of world class combinations but I think many riders would honestly say they with prefer to win Badminton or Burghley over WEG or the Olympics.
So what does Adelaide have that brings it onto a level playing field with the other four stars. For starters there isn’t an antipodean pony club dressage judges in sight. The Ground Jury is headed by Frenchman Michel Asseray and asssisted by Sandy Phillips of the UK and Jutta Koivula of Finland. In addition, the TD is Andy Griffiths from the UK.
So in the end you need to judge for yourself. Do what many of Australia’s Eventers do, hop on a plane come to Adelaide and Enjoy the “Party in the Park” it is fun, exciting and attracts, Australia’s best combinations.
A quick video interview with Wendy Schaeffer, 2nd after the morning dressage
A few years ago, Course Designer Mike Etherington-Smith handed over the reigns to local Course Designer Wayne Copping. Even today you can still see remnants of Mike ES on the course in his famous “Ducks”. But the reality is, this is now a Wayne Copping Course. Wayne, himself a showjumper is a real student of course design and I know now already has begun plans for 2011 in his mind.
His courses are never tricky but instead reward those combinations who can hold a correct line through a complex, can be trusted over skinnies and have the endurance to make it through the tough windy track that is a consequence of holding the event in a public park.
Most important, you need juice in the tank to make it to the end. Last year the fence that caused most issues was the second to last, two big corners on a slight curve, some riders either didn’t have the juice or failed to respect the distance and had a stop.
The four star track looks great and this morning’s rain will help to soften any hard spots. The double duck bounce into the water is sure to sharpen them up and then it is followed a few fences later by the bounce stairs up to the skinny which is also quite a good drop down the hill. Much more of the course to look at, it is 6300m long and just over 11 minutes so there is no doubt that XC will be a test.
Dressage has started well with the first session just completed and the early leader is Emma Mason on F1 Pharinelli sitting on 52.0 with Wendy Schaeffer following on 56.8. The remaining two thirds of the combinations start later today.
