So much for a slow news day. In the past couple of days, something minor came up with TruLuck and the decision has been made to remove him from the list of US horses traveling to the Pau CCI4* (Nov 4th to 7th). My understanding is that there was a possibility that TruLuck could have gotten to Pau and been fine, but between the long travel and grant money the decision was made to save the horse for next year. This is unfortunate for Phillip because TruLuck has a good chance to win any event he enters. As a result, the list of riders receiving grants to go to Pau has been winnowed to two:
Lainey Ashker and Anthony Patch
Boyd Martin and Remington
Remington was 12th at Rolex earlier this year and “AI” placed 14th. Both of those horses have a great chance to represent the US really well at Pau and we will enjoy cheering them on from afar, although I have contemplated buying a plane ticket to France. One thing that I wrote about this morning is the difficulty of the journey to Pau. The US horses will have five straight days off for their journey–Wednesday of next week to the following Monday. This will pose special challenges to Boyd and Lainey to make sure both horses get refocused in time for the competition.
In a developing story, word is that the journey to Pau might be complicated more by the ongoing French labor strikes. So help me God if the US eventing team is hampered by pouting French taxi drivers.
Don’t forget about our live blog tonight at 7:00pm ET with Hannah and Sinead.
Go eventing.
