Adelaide CCI4* Cross Country

A tender moment between Megan Jones and Jester (Festy)

An eventful day of cross country at Adelaide has resulted in some big changes on the leader board. Overnight leader Megan Jones dropped out of contention with a stop at the double of ducks. I spoke with Megan after cross country and she blamed herself for riding too hard. They got in too deep at the bounce and glanced off with nowhere else to go. That said, Megan is ecstatic that Jester who has been out of competition for over a year had a great round and “felt like he had never been out of work”.

Shane Rose and Taurus in the lead after XC

All horses and riders are home safe and sound. The new leader is Shane Rose who now leads in both the CCI4* and CCI2* classes, Shane and Sonja Johnson who shot up from 11th to second were the only double clears for the day. Of the 31 starters 21 made it home, only 8 picked up jumping penalties but time was elusive for 19 combination.

Emma Scott and Mustang

Weather conditions were almost perfect with an overcast day, a light breeze helped to keep the temperature nice. We had a couple of falls on course, including what initially looked bad with Crystal Conning taking a huge tumble down the hill after the double ducks but after a few minutes Crystal walked off smiling.

Crystal Conning after her dramatic fall

The 10 min 47 second track certainly tested the endurance of the horses and in the 10 minute box many looked pretty tired but perked up really quickly after a good dousing in ice water.

Here is the leader board after XC. Full results here.

More pics below. I also have video and lots of pics of the flying Frenchman doing their human show jumping, I will post that separately, they are mostly in their underwear.