Michael Pollard and the lovely grey mare Schoensgreen Hanni scored a 44.5 to put them into second place behind Jessica Phoenix and Pavarotti with 15 rides still to compete at the Pan American Games Friday afternoon. Michael resisted the temptation to let Hanni get too bouncy and rode her forward to create the look of a relaxed, forward, and accurate test. After his test, Michael said that he was really pleeased that Hanni: “presented exactly what we’ve been working on with no major mistakes.“
Puerto Rico and Ecuador broke North America’s stranglehold on the top of the leader board mid Friday afternoon. Lauren Billys of Puerto Rico and Ballingowan Ginger scored 48.9. I had the pleasure of meeting Lauren yesterday on the buss ride to the Santa Sofia Country Club. She was really nice and explained that she is currently taking a break from studying wine making at Fresno State to compete her horse Ginger–if only UVa had had wine making as a major. I’m sure you have noticed that Lauren Billys’ and Shannon Lilley’s horses both start with the word “Ballingowan.” They were purchased by the same lady in Ireland, who brought them into eventing before shipping them over to the states where they continued to compete together. Now they are riding against each other at the Pan American Games.
Ronald and Mr. Wiseguy also jumped ahead of a couple US and Canadian pairs with a 52.0. Phillip is here coaching Ronald, his long time student, this weekend and I know they will be working together on ways to squeeze every last second out of the cross-country course tomorrow. Currently, Lauren is 3rd, Ronald is 6th, and the remaining top 8 places are all Canadian and US riders with Jessica Phoenix still on top. There are still about 15 horses to compete as I am writing this including two Canadians and one US pair, so stay tuned for late changes to the scoreboard.
Some of the scores are posted online here, but they are not live: [Scores]
Rebecca Howard and Roquefort’s dressage ride changed the nature of the competition between the US and Canada. Roquefort has been brilliant for Rebecca all year but for whatever reason the environment seemed to get him just a little too tense today. He had several bobbles and at times was looking around and slightly hollow. They scored a 51.3 and although I know that Rebecca will do everything to make up the lost ground in the jumping phases, the pressure is now really on Canada’s remaining two riders to put together quality tests.
Hannah’s and Lynn’s tests for USA from Friday morning:
Cross-country is tentatively scheduled to start at 11am local time on Saturday, which would be 12pm ET. Go eventing.
