Nilson Moreira da Silva and Tiger Lu. Photo by Leslie Wylie.
Nilson Moreira da Silva may ride under the Brazilian flag but ever since he moved to the States in 2011, he’s been embraced as one of our eventing community’s own.
Based in Aiken with Laura VanderVliet, he’s done well for himself on American turf. He has two horses competing at the Advanced level: L & N Equestrian’s Magnum’s Martini, with whom he finished third in the Chattahoochee Hills CIC3* in May, and The Phoenix Syndicate’s Muggle, who narrowly missed a top-10 finish in the Jersey Fresh CCI3* this year and came fourth in the Poplar Place CIC3* in March.
Nilson Moreira da Silva and Muggle at Millbrook last weekend. Photo by Jenni Autry.
He left his own horses at home this week, however, to catch a ride on a his fellow countryman Luciano Miranda Drubi’s Tiger Lu at the Olympic Test Event in Rio de Janeiro. The 9-year-old Brazilian bred gelding has a CIC and CCI apiece at the one- and two-star levels under his belt.
Observation: Brazilian eventers seem to be quite generous about sharing their mounts with riders based abroad, who in turn seem quite brave to take them up on the offer! Ruy Fonseca’s Aquece Rio mount Quaint Normand, who was unfortunately spun at the first horse inspection, was a catch ride as well.
Nilson Moreira da Silva and Tiger Lu (with Marilyn Payne, president of the 2016 Olympic ground jury, in the judge’s box!). Photo by Leslie Wylie.
Tiger Lu, a 9-year-old Brazilian bred gelding, has completed one CIC and one CCI apiece at the one- and two-star levels. Nilson tactfully piloted him through this morning’s dressage test, which scored a 63.3 for 16th place.
The horse was a bit low in the bridle and reluctant to really push forward into the contact, but Nilson says he’s looking forward to tomorrow’s cross-country course and expects that it will catch a few riders out so the pair may well climb up the leaderboard yet — although it seems to me that making it through the finish flags on a catch ride is an accomplishment in and of itself!
Nilson kindly took a few moments to chat with us about his Olympic ambitions, his plans for the rest of the year and the strategy behind Brazil’s increasingly competitive eventing program:
Go Eventing.
