Classic Eventing Nation

Sometimes, as an eventing journalist, every indicator of form, every number you crunch, every likelihood you put forth crumbles under the impact of a classic fairytale eventing day. It happened a few years ago in Aachen, when Michael Jung and fischerChipmunk FRH held a commanding lead, and I joined Diarm Byrne of EquiRatings on his Eventing Podcast to discuss the seeming inevitability of his win in the next day’s cross-country. There looked, we said, to be no room for any other outcome to the competition; with the buzz of unpredictability removed, we had to find our thrills in other avenues, like, we suggested, the sheer thrill of being able to witness total sporting dominance from one of eventing’s greatest riders of all time, if not the greatest rider of all time.

Then, cross-country happened, and Michi won, but then he didn’t – he was belatedly awarded a flag penalty and toppled down the leaderboard, giving Sandra Auffarth the victory and throwing up a plot-twist storyline that none of us could have anticipated. It was a day I learned how thrilling, how discombobulating, it can be to be totally and utterly wrong.

This morning, as I wrote the final horse inspection report and pointed out that two-phase Luhmühlen CCI5* leader Ros Canter and Izilot DHI had two rails and a second on the clock in hand, I said the following: “it’s hard to imagine, now, a scenario in which the Pau winners don’t win this class. Izilot hasn’t had a rail down in an FEI class since his CCI2*-S debut five years ago.”

But I knew, even as I wrote it, that eventing doesn’t always work that way. If you were to put money on the outcome of today’s competition, you’d have been silly to bet in any other direction than on Ros – though the odds would have been so short that the pay-off would have been pretty minimal. But there’s a reason eventing isn’t a betting man’s game, and there’s a reason we all return to it, hungry for more, even when it’s beaten us down and worn us out and made us doubt the bedrock of our worlds. We return for the magic, and the days when kismet wins out.

That clear round feeling: Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and Hooney d’Arville. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Luhmühlen is renowned for building a big, tough showjumping track that’s the hardest of the five-stars. Today, it absolutely was every inch a top-tier track, and just six of the 31 starters were able to come home clear and inside the time allowed. When Belgium’s Lara de Liedekerke-Meier did so on her homebred five-star debutant, Hooney d’Arville, the cheer from the packed stands was colossal, and Lara’s emotion palpable. Then, she returned to the collecting ring, organised her feelings, celebrated with her horse, and didn’t watch either of the two rounds to come.

But she knew, part way through second-placed Jennifer Kuehnle’s round, that the 22-year-old Irish rider had tipped two poles, which was enough to push her up into second place.

‘Second place – that’s very good,’ she thought to herself, and settled into the comfortable notion no more of climbing – there was no way, after all, that Ros would have two fences down with her excellent jumping horse, who had won Pau last year over an equally tough showjumping track.

And then her husband, Belgian team trainer and former top-level German competitor Kai Steffen Meier, came towards her in the collecting ring.

“He didn’t say anything – he just came to me and he cried. He didn’t say anything!” she laughs. “Then he hugged me – ‘you won,’ he said. I said ‘no, Ros didn’t have two down – her horse is a good jumper.’  ‘No, no you won’, he said – and then all the Belgians arrived and jumped on me.”

Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and Hooney d’Arville. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Lara didn’t believe that it could be true until someone was able to pull up the live leaderboard and show her her name at the top – and the name of her eleven-year-old mare, in whom she’s placed so much hope. Ros Canter and Izilot DHI had indeed had two rails, both very close to the end of the course: the first had fallen at fence 11 of 13, and the second at the first part of the double at 12A. Both could have come down and still secured her the win, but the time on today’s track had proven hard to catch all morning long – and so ultimately, it was 2 time penalties that clinched it, moving Ros and ‘Isaac’ down to a very respectable fourth and opening the door for Lara to take the win by 0.4 penalties. In doing so, she becomes Belgium’s first-ever five-star winner, having climbed from first-phase sixth on a score of 31.6 plus 4 time penalties yesterday – but this week, her expectations had only ever gone as far as hoping to sharpen up her riding and reactions ahead of the Paris Olympics, for which she has an extraordinary five horses qualified.

“I never thought there would be a chance [of winning],” she admits. “I just knew I had a good horse, and I was in tunnel [vision] – I just wanted to jump the best round I could. I’m quite a slow rider in the jumping, which cost me victory at Boekelo last year,  and it cost me the Seven Year Old  World Championship last year, and so I thought, ‘you know what, it’s going to cost me something again – but let’s try to jump clear.’”

The girl came good: Lara de Liedekerke-Meier celebrates her special homebred Hooney. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

That acceptance allowed her to keep her head on the long pull down to the final fence, which followed along the edge of the arena after the influential double, and invited riders to rush and panic and or pull and miss to the last. But Lara was determined to do none of those things.

“A lot of people did nine [strides] to the last, and my jumping trainer said, ‘it’s definitely eight, so just keep going to the last one,’” she says. “I almost lifted my head to watch the clock [on the screen in front of me] but I didn’t, and then I didn’t care, I’d just jumped clear!”

Then, though, “I looked at the clock, and I was like ‘oh – we’re inside the time!’,” she laughs. “It’s just one of those days. I’m always watching them on social media and I’m never thinking I’m part of them. Maybe I should have a bit more self confidence here and there – but I do think that at some point, if you just keep working and keep believing and having good horses, then one day, it just comes together. Today was my day.”

Working and believing – in her horses, even if she struggles to believe in herself – have been the watchwords for Lara. She’s one of the busiest riders on the European eventing circuit, as evidenced by her abundance of Olympic-qualified horses, and she continually produces horses from the ground up, including those from her small breeding programme at Arville, where she’s based with Kai and their two children. And it’s always been hope, and that dogged belief, that’s pulled her through – even when thing have gotten really, really hard to deal with.

Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and Hooney d’Arville. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

One of the low points that she’s overcome came at this very venue. In 2011, Lara rode Hooney’s mother, the excellent Nooney Blue, at the European Championships here. Nooney Blue was, at that point, her horse of a lifetime: together, they’d come up through the Junior and Young Rider teams, and made their Senior debut at the 2010 World Championships.

But 2011 was to be her last year of competition.

“She broke down  in the European Championship during cross country, and that was the last time I rode her,” says Lara, who has referred to her successes here this week as ‘revenge on the past’. “She needed to go back in the trailer back to the stables. We didn’t know how bad the injury was, and then I just wanted to bring her home and to give her time and then we try to have a foal. At first it didn’t work, and then this one, Hooney, came. My dad will probably have already sent me a message that [this win] is thanks to him, who went to pick up the semen!”

Because Hooney had her mother’s huge shoes to fill, though, Lara found it difficult to remove the weight of expectation from her as she produced her.

“I’ve been really hard on this horse, because I think I was so emotionally involved,” she admits, explaining that she would take it personally if the mare made a mistake – an emotional response and tangible disappointment that then led to Hooney and her rider losing faith in one another.

“I so wanted her to become a good horse, and she has been really tricky. She’d have fences down, or go up in the dressage, or not look at jumps.  She’s proven [what a talent she is] today, but it was hard to believe [for a long time]. I knew that everyone was right, and she was a good horse, but I thought I was maybe just not the right rider, which was hard for me to understand.”

A partnership forged through meeting in the middle: Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and Hooney d’Arville. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

The turning point came for the mare when Lara learned to remove the pressure – something that’s only totally fallen into place this season.

“I have four other horses qualified for the Olympics and I thought, ‘you know, she’s not ready to go for the Olympics anyway’, and I just took off the pressure,” she says. With that in mind, she decided to aim for a step up to five-star instead, to further develop her horse and also to give herself a challenge and keep herself on her A-game ahead of Paris.

“I never came here thinking I’m going to be [in the top spot]. I never thought I would even be at the press conference! Last time I did a 5* was in 2017, and it’s a long time — having children and building a business and all that, it took a lot of time,” she says.

Yesterday, she summed up the process of learning to work with the mare perfectly: “I didn’t take her just as one of the horses I had in my yard – it needed to be this horse who needed to step up. So I think maybe [her being tricky], it was more my mistake,” she said after her cross-country round.  “But now I accept that she cannot be under too much pressure. I accept that she’s sometimes a bit spooky. I accept that she jogs in the walk, and I think because she feels I’m not getting upset she tries harder, while before it was just like, she thought, ‘anyway, she’s never happy with me!’ I don’t think I was ever not happy with her, but I think she disappointed me. I was much more emotional about her. The other horses, they’d jog, and I’d say, ‘okay, they jog. I go do the job, I finish, it’s fine’. I’ve got all the time in the world for them, whereas with her it was always  like, ‘why didn’t she do it right?’”

Lara celebrates with her team, including husband Kai and groom Betti Cardi. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Even once she’d decided to make the entry here – an entry that husband Kai wasn’t initially on board with, as he didn’t want Lara to take unnecessary risks ahead of the Olympics – she had her doubts. Those came not least because of the recent tragic passing of Georgie Campbell, who was honoured this week by purple and white flower decorations around the main arena and who each and every rider had in their minds as they tackled the combined test of balancing competition and fresh, sharp grief.

“It’s been ten years now since Ben Winter died here, and now Georgie,” she says. “I still think the sport is fantastic, and I’m never doubting that I want to do this sport. But for sure, when you see your children while you’re leaving the start box… yesterday, I had a chat with Pietro Roman in the warm-up, and I said to him, ‘why are we doing this?’ But then you go and you just do it, and you have this partnership with your horse and everything that you’ve worked for for so long. And I think, we can have a car accident or something at any time, so we shouldn’t be scared of anything we love. Sometimes accidents do happen, and I try not to think like that, but for sure, when the stress level is high, you have all these misty emotions in your head. You have to make it clear. Yesterday, I jumped fence one with a lot of emotions, fence two with a lot of doubts, and from fence three, everything was clear again in my head.”

Nothing will ever completely heal the wound that’s left in the sport when we lose one of our own; the loss of Georgie, like the loss of Ben ten years ago, will knit over into a hard knot of scar tissue that we will all carry with us. But Lara’s words are a sage reminder of the love, the work, the passion, and the community that will keep us all working on making each day better than the last.

Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and Hooney d’Arville. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

“I love it every day I do it. I love being with horses,” she says. That, too, pulled her up from her last low ebb two years ago, which marked the rock bottom before an incredible trajectory that she’s been climbing ever since.

“Two years ago was really hard. Falling at fence one at the World Championships was awful – when you’re on your head on the ground, and your horse is standing there, you’re just like, ‘no, I’ve got to wake up, it can’t be true.’  And then my husband changed job from a rider to the Team Manager for Belgium, and that changed a lot of my [mental] balance, too. I always wanted to please him and never put him in a position that he had to choose me over other people. I’m quite weak at staying strong mentally, and I need, really, to have an organisation and a plan. Now, I’m much stronger because I understand my mindset much easier, but before it was limited. Now I’m trusting the process much more.”

And now, too, we hope that Lara will see in herself what so many around her have seen for so long: a true champion.

Tom McEwen and CHF Cooliser. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Tom McEwen was able to climb up two places to finish second with CHF Cooliser, who finished in the same place at Pau on her five-star debut in 2021. This season marks a long-awaited return to competition for the sparky 14-year-old, who sat out 2023 after finishing eleventh at Burghley the autumn prior.

Her exceptional week as pathfinder for this class began with a 30.8, which was good enough to see her sit fourth after dressage. She held the same placing after yesterday’s cross-country, in which she added 5.2 time penalties while giving the rest of the field to come a confidence-boosting masterclass in how to navigate its twists and turns. Today, she added nothing to her score with an attacking, nippy round that, Tom explains with a laugh, was very much ‘Eliza’s’ way or the highway.

“I’m just delighted with the way that Cooliser went about her job today,” he says. “She’s very game – in the arena I remembered why I couldn’t  go any faster yesterday, because I don’t really have that much control [when I do!]. Even though I’ve barely asked her anything, she seems to want to have an argument and tell me that I’m wrong, so it’s just much easier going her way!”

But Eliza’s feisty red-headedness is what makes her such a gritty, great eventing horse – and Tom, who’s learned when and how to negotiate with her, and when to let her pick her pace and support her through it, is thrilled to have her back in his string of top-level horses.

“I’m delighted with how the whole week has gone with all my horses,” he says, referring to the game efforts of five-star debutant Brookfield Quality, who ran very well but pulled up late on course with a nosebleed, and JL Dublin, who he had in the CCI4*-S vying for Olympic selection.

Yasmin Ingham and Rehy DJ. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Another British rider doing double duty across the classes was Yasmin Ingham, who finished third in the CCI5* for the second year in a row with Rehy DJ and also executed a serious climb up from first-phase 28^th place to do so.

“I think this is the story of eventing – it’s why it’s a three phase competition,” she says. “It’s never over until we finish on the final day, and you just need to believe; you must never give up.  I believe that I’m sat on a brilliant jumping horse — his best phases are the cross country and the showjumping, so I was very much looking forward to Saturday and Sunday this weekend.”

It was “a little bit disappointing”, she says, to begin her week on an uncharacteristic 36.9, but, she says sagely, “he just wasn’t quite on side with me as much as he can be, so we’ll go away and work a little bit harder with that and try and come out next time and be a little bit more competitive with the dressage. But my goodness, he is just the most incredible jumping horse, and he gives me the most amazing feeling in the showjumping. He’s careful and fast and an absolute pleasure to ride, so I feel very lucky to be the one piloting him.”

Yasmin Ingham and Rehy DJ. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Yas and ‘Piglet’s’ clear inside the time today boosted them a further three places from the 22 they climbed yesterday when adding just 2 time penalties to their first-phase score.

“He was very, very on it the whole way around,” she says of their cross-country round. “He never looks like he’s going that fast, but he’s very easy in that I don’t really have to set him up for the fences. He’s quite adjustable, so I can just ride in a rhythm the whole way around the course. He makes it easy for me to not be fighting – we just stay in the same cruising rhythm.”

“He was looking for the flags the whole way around and he was very brave and confident everywhere. I think it’s safe to say he likes Luhmühlen; he was third here last year as well, so I’m very proud of him to have another 5* podium.”

Their partnership has been forged from the earliest stages of Yas’s professional career.

“I’ve had him since a very, very young horse, and we’ve gone up the levels together. We were at the Young Rider Europeans in 2018 and he was fourth – he nearly won the Bronze medal. So to have come up from literally Novice together, it’s just a dream. I’m very proud of him for our journey together, and I’m excited to see that maybe we can climb even further up a 5*  leaderboard in the future.”

Ros Canter and Izilot DHI. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Though Ros’s drop to fourth will be a surprise and a disappointment, the week has also been an incredible showcase of the quirky, talented young horse’s ability and mental maturity. He’s historically struggled with spooky demons, but this week, he danced his way to the first-phase lead on a score of 24.9 without batting an eyelid at all the decorations and atmosphere of the main arena, and then looked exceptional and totally focused across the country en route to adding just 2 time penalties and holding that lead overnight. Today, he jumped exceptionally, and while it wasn’t their day, Ros will no doubt leave the event emboldened by how well Isaac’s continuing development is going. And there will, make no doubt about it, be another major win on the horizon for them.

Alice Casburn and Topspin. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

22-year-old Alice Casburn was no doubt disappointed to begin her week with a dressage score of 38 – several points higher than expected –  with her homebred Topspin, but that disappointment will be far behind her.

Now, the pair can boast their third five-star top-ten finish, adding fifth place behind Ros and Izilot DHI in the final standings here to their Burghley seventh and fifth places, picked up in 2023 and 2022, respectively.

No one who has followed the pair for the past few seasons will be much surprised, though: they’ve now tackled seven five-stars, jumped clear around five of them, and squeezed in an individual bronze medal at the Young Rider Europeans in between them in 2022, too. Though Topspin, who still lives in the stable he was born in, and whose dam and granddam were competed by Alice’s mother, Caroline, isn’t a 20s scorer on the flat, he’s a canny, capable, confident cross-country horse and an excellent showjumper, as is his petite, gutsy rider. Together, the pair have tackled puissance courses, have showjumped plenty, have stepped up to the highest ranks of eventing, and have forged a partnership that looks like a pony novel writ large.

And, of course, today they jumped a quick clear round to add no penalties and become one of just two pairs to finish on their dressage score this week. It’s classic eventing at its best, and a testament, too, to Luhmühlen’s well-earned status as a five-star competition, even if it’s occasionally underestimated by those who’ve not yet been to it.

Kirsty Chabert and Opposition Heraldik Girl. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

It would have been easy – and, perhaps, lazy – to have written off Kirsty Chabert’s teeny-weeny Opposition Heraldik Girl (yet another homebred!) coming into this event. It was to be her third-ever attempt at five-star; on her debut, which came at Pau last year, she was eliminated for a horse fall on cross-country, and at Badminton this year, she was withdrawn before cross-country.

But actually, though she be but little, she is fierce, and all that – something that could just as easily be said about Kirsty, who has produced the mare through her career. They’d had plenty of good, quite quick, decisive cross-country runs previously, and, most notably, a lot of very, very tidy showjumping rounds.

It was the latter that clinched an exceptional finish for the pair today over Luhmühlen’s notoriously big, tough, technical showjumping track. They’d been out in the boondocks after dressage, sitting 26^th on a score of 36.7, but yesterday’s cross-country round, in which they added just 4.8 time penalties, saw them boosted to eighth place. Today, they delivered one of just six clears inside the tight time to step up another two places to a final sixth.

Jennifer Kuehnle and Polly Blue Eyes. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

It’s been an extraordinary five-star debut for 22-year-old Irish rider Jennifer Kuehnle, who delivered the first clear round inside the time on yesterday’s cross-country with Polly Blue Eyes and then jumped a classy clear just after the major storm to add 14 time faults with second ride Sammy Davis Junior.

That was enough to put her in second with the first horse and twelfth with the second going into today’s showjumping finale – and when she came into the ring early in the order with Sammy Davis Junior, she showed exactly why, as a teenager, she enjoyed such success on showjumping teams. They delivered a capable clear just one second over the time allowed, which boosted them up to an eventual eighth.

The podium finish wasn’t to be with Polly Blue Eyes, but her two rails, which came at fence 8 and fence 12A, the first part of the double, only dropped her a handful of places, and she comes away from her first crack at this level in seventh with her German-bred mare. It’s an extraordinary testament to the rising talent in the Irish ranks – and the self-belief that Ireland’s recent successes, starting with Austin O’Connor’s victory at Maryland last year, are engendering among them.

David Doel and Galileo Nieuwmoed. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Great Britain’s David Doel and his Burghley runner-up Galileo Nieuwmoed added another five-star to their top-ten tally – they’ve previously placed at Burghley, Badminton, Pau, and Kentucky – and added their ninth consecutive international placing to their record when taking ninth place today. Though they might not have done so in the way they’d have like to, tipping fences 8 and 10 and adding 2 time penalties, they still roundly impressed this weekend: theirs was the fastest round of the day yesterday, some seventeen seconds inside the time, and it’s getting harder and harder to imagine that they’ll be kept out of the top spot at this level for long.

Pietro Sandei and Rubis de Prere. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Italy’s Pietro Sandei and his stalwart partner, the nineteen-year-old Rubis de Prere, put a tricky morning behind them – they were held for the second time this week at this morning’s final horse inspection – to deliver the goods in the ring. They left every jump in its cup and added a relatively scant 1.2 time penalties to put a cap on their weeklong climb from nineteenth and finish tenth – their best-ever finish at the level.

Emily Hamel and Corvett. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Emily Hamel and Corvett jumped a characteristic ebullient round that unfortunately tipped one rail – the first part of the double at 12A – and saw them add 2.8 time penalties, but that didn’t stop many of the riders gathered around the ringside from digging their start lists out of their pockets to check out the breeding of big-jumping ‘Barry’ and marvel at the pair’s style. It also wasn’t a mistake that cost them any placings from last night’s finish; in fact, they were able to climb one spot to finish fifteenth, completing a very respectable rise from first-phase 35^th.

Katherine Coleman and Monbeg Senna had two late-course rails down at fences 10 and 11, and they, too added time, putting an additional 3.6 time penalties on their score card to take 30^th place. Their weekend, which saw them battle some of the worst of the weather on the cross-country course yesterday, will have given the talented gelding a wealth of valuable experience as Katherine looks ahead to, hopefully, an autumn start at Boekelo’s Nations Cup finale and then a trip to Kentucky next spring, all being well.

And so, for now, we come to the end of the CCI5* at Luhmühlen – but that’s not all from us. Keep it locked on EN for a full report from today’s CCI4*-S showjumping finale, which also hosted the German National Championships and acts as a crucial final selection trial for the Paris Olympics, and stand by, too, for plenty more from Germany over the next few days, including an exclusive interview with Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and husband Kai on balancing team and marital duties, the uptick of Belgium, and much, much more.

Until then: Go Eventing!

The top ten after an emotional whirlwind of a morning at the Luhmühlen CCI5*.

EN’s coverage of the Longines Luhmühlen Horse Trials is brought to you by Kentucky Performance Products, your go-to source for science-backed nutritional support across all types of horses, disciplines, and needs. Click here to learn more about what KPP can do for your horse — thank you for supporting our wonderful sponsors!

Longines Luhmühlen: Website | Entries | Timetable | Live Scores | Tickets | Livestream | EN’s Coverage

Ros Canter and Izilot DHI. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Talk about unsociable: despite last night’s party raging on until nearly three in the morning, and German party tunes still ringing in everyone’s ears, this morning’s duo of final horse inspections at Luhmühlen still, rather rudely, started bang on at 7.30 in the morning.

Everyone may have been a touch bleary-eyed, but the horses certainly weren’t. Despite running intense tracks yesterday, we saw horse after horse being flown like a kite, thanks, in no small part, to the truly exceptional ground that they all ran over yesterday.

The CCI5* presented first to a ground jury comprised of president Anne-Mette Binder, and 31 of yesterday’s 33 finishers came forward after the overnight withdrawal of Britain’s Laura Birley and Bob Cotton Bandit and Sweden’s Christoffer Forsberg and Con Classic. Two horses were asked to trot again immediately: Ireland’s Robbie Kearns and Ballyvillane OBOS were then promptly accepted, while Italy’s Pietro Sandei and Rubis de Prere were sent to the holding box for the second time this week. They were subsequently accepted and will go into this morning’s showjumping in eleventh place. Ros Canter and Izilot DHI hold their lead overnight with two rails and a second in hand; it’s hard to imagine, now, a scenario in which the Pau winners don’t win this class. Izilot hasn’t had a rail down in an FEI class since his CCI2*-S debut five years ago. 

Pietro Sandei and Rubis de Prere. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

The CCI4*-S also had a horse inspection today, which is protocol when a short format class is held with showjumping last. Here, we had rather more drama in the form of morning withdrawals. Sweden’s Aria Ramkali pulled 34th placed Flanders overnight, and second-placed Laura Collett withdrew London 52 this morning due to a minor injury to his coronet band.

“Unfortunately London 52 managed to slice into his coronet band whilst out on the XC,” writes Laura in a post on her Instagram account. “Although a very minor injury I don’t feel it’s in his best interest to SJ today therefore have made the very difficult decision to withdraw him

As always his welfare comes first and it’s my job to do what’s right by him, however devastating it is. He was scintillating round the XC yesterday and we will be back fighting for the win soon.”

Yasmin Ingham and Banzai du Loir. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

This is a major moment for the competition itself, which now sees fellow Brits Yasmin Ingham and Tom McEwen in second and third place, respectively, with their Olympic prospects Banzai du Loir and JL Dublin — but it’s also a tense moment for the British selection storyline, which reaches its denouement with this final trial ahead of an announcement in the next week or so. It’s hard to imagine that the selectors will feel that London 52 still needs to prove himself in showjumping, at which he’s a specialist, but what will remain to be seen is how quickly the injury can heal so the pair can get back on track with their fitness targets. And, of course, it now gives us a rather familiar one-two: Yasmin Ingham and Banzai du Loir will showjump in second place to Michael Jung and fischerChipmunk FRH. The last time we saw that was at the 2022 World Championships, where a shock two fences for Michi saw Yas take the title. Could it be another case of déjà vu today?

Antonia Baumgart and Lamango. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Elsewhere in this class, we saw Germany’s Antonia Baumgart held with Lamango, but accepted upon representation. 

52 horses and riders will go ahead to showjumping in this class. We’ll kick off with the 5* from 9.25 a.m. (8.25 a.m. BST/3.25 a.m. EST), followed by the 4*, which incorporates the German National Championship and this crucial Olympic stepping stone, from 12.15 p.m. (11.15 a.m. BST/6.15 a.m. EST). You can follow all the action live on Horse & Country TV, and join us later for an in-depth round-up of the biggest stories of the day. 

Until then — Go Eventing!

EN’s coverage of the Longines Luhmühlen Horse Trials is brought to you by Kentucky Performance Products, your go-to source for science-backed nutritional support across all types of horses, disciplines, and needs. Click here to learn more about what KPP can do for your horse — thank you for supporting our wonderful sponsors!

Longines Luhmühlen: Website | Entries | Timetable | Live Scores | Tickets | Livestream | EN’s Coverage

For the last eighteen months or so, I’ve felt my grasp on eventing journalism slacken in favour of something else – something I’d never planned. These days, I feel, I need to engage less and less in in-depth analysis of horse and rider performance; less, too, in unpacking the intricacies of courses. Probably, at this point, I don’t even need to bother revisiting the FEI record database on the daily. Because since the advent of the 2023 season, all I am, really, is a bit of a crap weather lady.

Now, frankly, my career is mostly just this.

“It rained again today,” is the summation of basically every event report I’ve written in that time period. Badminton 2023? All about the rain. Last year’s European Championships? Similarly, an event that gets referenced time and time again, purely because we talk about its weather and, as a result, its footing. Pau last year? Rained so hard it killed my camera. May it rest in peace in the big hard drive in the sky.

And so, once again, here I am, talking to you about – what else! – weather, and the part it played in this morning’s CCI5* cross-country at Luhmühlen.

The day started early, at 8.45 a.m., in order to account for a stacked entry list in this afternoon’s Meßmer Trophy CCI4*-S (more on that, soon), and although we only had 41 starters to work through after the last-minute withdrawal of Great Britain’s Will Rawlin and The Partner, we somehow saw just as many weather fronts move over the Lower Saxony region. We started with a foreboding overcast sky; by the time our third starters, Sweden’s Christoffer Forsberg and Hippo’s Sapporo, got underway, the wet stuff had begun to fall, though in a non-committal sort of way.

Well, you can call me a commitmentphobe all you like now, because when it decided it was all in, it was all in. For the next hour or so, the rain hammered down with such force that it became tricky to make out who you were actually looking at on course, so thank god for Luhmühlen’s penchant for bright fence decorations, because otherwise, the riders themselves may not have even been able to find their way through the course’s numerous bends and loops.

Lauren Lillywhite and Hacien in the midst of the first storm of the day. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Then, just as abruptly as it had started, having had its fill of torturing everyone and topping up the water jumps, the dark cloud passed and an unrecognisably sunny spell kicked into play.

How nice, we all thought – how delightful! A real return to the Luhmühlen we all know and love, where we pull our shorts out and get a bit of a tan and drink Pimms by the arena and sweat, gently or quite ferociously, all week. A little treat! A touch of nostalgia.

‘lol u thought’, typed the weather, having at this point morphed into nothing better or more fulfilling than a troll in a comment section. ‘sike!’ it continued, giving no regard at all to the fact that that’s actually probably meant to be spelled ‘psych’.

A big sad. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

So then it gave us the big one, just to put us back in our place. I’ve since seen the whole thing slightly overexaggerated on the internet by livestream viewers, who have referred to it as a ‘hurricane’ that shut the show down and sent fences flying, and, look, it wasn’t quite that. But it was bad; not only did the rain return, but it brought with it black skies, extraordinary wind that sent umbrellas and marquees and advertising boards flying and had small children clinging onto the nearest solid object for dear life, and thunder and lightning that struck a tree on site and forced the local fire brigade, who’d been busy trying to have their annual summer party, to come out and attempt to safely dismantle it.

Hunkered under a tree at the final water complex, with a pack-a-mac wetly slapping me in the face, I did briefly consider that I might be about to have a very bad time indeed. Would I be skewered by a flying umbrella? Struck by lightning, which would only be fair since I’d chosen to hide under a tree while holding a long metal monopod? Would the sausage van sadly sizzling away downwind come loose from its moorings and pork me to death, but not in, like, a fun way?

I reckon a few of the riders, who’d been unlucky enough to draw late start times in this class, and found themselves held while we all waited for the storm to pass, probably felt much the same way. Tom McEwen and his second ride, overnight runner up Brookfield Quality, were held in an avenue of trees just after the second water, and Tom describes the experience as “being like one of those polytunnels that cyclists train in against the wind. I mean, literally, I was lying on his neck and we were getting smashed by acorns. I think the trees were coming down, and I did think for the first ever time in my life, ‘should I just stop and tell them it’s dangerous, and I’ll start from here again?’”

Red on right, white on left, ‘no thanks’ in the middle.

But all this chat is so relevant to the broader business of reporting on horse form at events, and not just as a scene-setting bit of frippery. Tom and Brookfield Quality were restarted once the storm passed, but retired just a couple of fences from home when the horse started to have a nosebleed. Whether that’s in any way connected to the storm and the hold is something we’ll never really know – but Ireland’s Susie Berry and her second ride, Kilcandra Capitol, also ended up retiring on course after being caught up in it all, and Sweden’s Christoffer Forsberg and Con Classic, whose final preparations were disrupted and their start time was prolonged due to the hold, ended up picking up 51.2 time penalties when they did make it out on course.

It’s easy enough to judge a horse and rider by numbers on a page, especially when you’re looking back over an FEI record, which loses so much of the context of the day itself – but when you factor in the realities of eventing, and all its strange variables (I once saw a good five-star horse pick up about a minute’s worth of time penalties, because it got caught up in the roping on course, and who can forget Kevin McNab picking up about the same when trying to reattach a broken rein to his horse’s bit at Pratoni?) you often find that it all gets a bit hard to quantify.

Ros Canter and Izilot DHI. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

But, I suppose, if the numbers were going to say anything about today’s competition before it started, it was that last year’s Pau winners, Ros Canter and her quirky Izilot DHI, were the most likely to find themselves still in the top spot on the leaderboard after today’s competition, despite an early retirement at Badminton when the 11-year-old got overfaced by the buzzy atmosphere of the lake.

And they’d be absolutely right. The pair, who put a 24.9 on the board in yesterday’s dressage, added just 2 time penalties during one of the day’s dry spells and will head into tomorrow’s showjumping with an 8.6 penalty lead. That’s two rails AND a second of time in hand – which isn’t too shabby for a horse who’s only ever had one rail in his international career, and that was at his first ever CCI2*-S five years ago.

Ros Canter and Izilot DHI. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

That’s tomorrow, and tomorrow’s story, though, and today’s all about cross-country, and also sock-wringing, a little bit.

“He’s an incredible horse – he’s so athletic and he has such a careful but scopey jump,” says Ros. “So if he’s settled and concentrating, then he often gives me the most amazing feeling and makes my life very easy.”

Ros, who also won Blenheim CCI4*-L with the gelding last year after a tricky summer saw them lose Bramham thanks to a spook and run-out at fence three, was delighted with her horse’s brain today, but very slightly frustrated with herself.

“To be quite honest, there were a couple of places where I felt I could have ridden a little bit better, but that was more of the plain fences than the complicated ones,” she says. “But he was just amazing to sit on today.”

Producing Isaac to temper his quick reactions has been a steady process, but one that Ros is reaping the rewards of now.

“It’s the time we put in every day at home with them. Eventing is all about the partnership you have with an animal, and Izilot is a fine example of that,” she says. “He’s quite a sensitive horse, and so it’s all about reading and understanding his personality. They’re just like humans, they’re all different. As much as we are trainers and riders, we’re probably also psychologists as much as anything else, so I think it’s all about trying to understand their personalities, and it’s our job to interpret that and to learn from it and get the best out of them.”

Having two rails in hand on a very good showjumping horse doesn’t mean that Ros is feeling complacent going into the finale tomorrow, which will begin with the final horse inspection at 7.30 a.m. (6.30 a.m. BST/1.30 a.m. EST).

“I think if anything, its puts the pressure on me really to try and get the job done,” she laughs. “He can be spooky at any moment. But, I think after today’s test that he’s done, he’ll probably be quite settled, and he’s super careful at the jumps.  It’s a privilege, really, to sit on him, and hopefully I can do him justice tomorrow.”

Jennifer Kuehnle, pictured riding twelfth-placed Sammy Davis Junior. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

We’re making great headway on the fourth CCI5* of the year, and already, we’re starting to see a theme for the year – and that is the inexorable rise of young Irish talent. At Badminton, second place went the way of one-horse rider Lucy Latta, who was making her five-star debut and logged the quickest round of the day in the process. Tonight, second place at Luhmühlen is held by 22-year-old Jennifer Kuehnle, also making her five-star debut. She rode two horses here today, but it was her first ride, the sharp, clever Polly Blue Eyes, who partnered her to the first clear round inside the time of the day, boosting them from 22^nd after dressage to overnight runners-up on a two-phase score of 35.5.

“If someone actually  told me I’d  be sitting second  after cross-country at my first 5*,  I think I would be laughing at them,” says Jennifer, who also holds 12^th place with Sammy Davis Junior after adding 14 time penalties in his end-of-class round.

“Polly’s very good in the dressage, and she does all the movements very well, but she’s just sometimes not rewarded as she should be – but in the cross country I knew she’d catch up,” continues the former Irish Junior and Young Rider team member, who made her Senior debut at last year’s European Championships with the sixteen-year-old. “She’s an amazing little mare across country, and no matter what or where you put her, she’s always trying to get to the far side of it. I’m just so proud of her today.”

It’s particularly nice to see Jennifer make this major career step in Germany: her father, Hans Kuehnle, was born and raised in Germany, and while he was the first horseman in his family, he’s created a special legacy in his new homeland of Ireland, where he runs Tullibards Stud. Polly Blue Eyes isn’t Irish-bred, though – she was born in Germany too, not far from Luhmühlen.

“We were in Germany looking at jumping horses, and dad said that we should try a friend’s horse that she had up for sale,” says Jennifer. “When I tried her she was very spooky, and she was actually annoying me a little bit. Then Dad made me take her and since she came home, I just absolutely loved her. She was very good to ride and the way she was brought up into eventing, she was just so well-trained and schooled that it made my life very easy.”

Since then, they’ve made the move together from Juniors to Young Riders to Senior level, and now onto five-star, with the help of Hans and Irish Olympian Cathal Daniels, who is Jennifer’s boyfriend.

“He’s been by my side now for a few years, and he helps me a lot on cross country,” she says. “In Millstreet two weeks ago was actually my first time to make the time in a 4*,  so coming here I didn’t think I’d make the time in the 5*, but I’ve been going from strength to strength. I have a lot of people helping me, and I’m just so thankful for that. Hopefully we can go a bit more strength by strength and we will be at the top soon.”

Making a five-star debut is a big enough task, as is riding two horses at this level – but doing both at the same time is a formidable challenge.

“They are two completely different horses,” adds Jennifer. “Polly is a Thoroughbred, so  she’s very quick across the ground and she’s very easy to set up for me, whereas Sammy, he’d be double the horse. He’s a big, rangy horse, and  he takes a bit more setting up to do, but they’re both equally as honest and good across country. They both had two completely different rounds, but they were both very nice rounds, I think. I couldn’t be prouder — two horses in the top 12, and I’m so thankful that they’re both healthy in their stables this evening. Tomorrow is another day, and hopefully it all works out well.”

Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and Hooney d’Arville jump the last. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Belgium’s crown jewel, Lara de Liedekerke-Meier, is making her return to five-star a very, very good one indeed. She last rode at the level here in 2017 with Alpaga d’Arville, but in the years since, her focus has been on team pathways and the steady, impressive rise of the Belgian front.

But this summer, with five horses qualified for Paris and everything coming up roses for Belgium, Lara wanted to keep herself sharp and push for a new challenge – or, more precisely, the revisiting of an old one. And so she decided to aim her homebred Hooney d’Arville, the daughter of her former Junior, Young Rider, and then World Championships and five-star ride, Nooney Blue, at a step up to the top level.

They began their week in sixth place after dressage on a score of 35.6, and today, headed out of the start box in the rain – not the really heavy stuff, but the noncommittal stuff – to deliver a quick, capable round that added just 4 time penalties to their scoresheet.

Now, they’ll head into tomorrow’s competition in third place – an extraordinary honour that’s the culmination of plenty of hard work, both over Hooney’s ridden career and in their round today.

“I had a lot of doubts coming to fence one,” admits Lara. “Then I took a forward shot to fence 2, and then finally, I did all the mistakes I needed to do by  fence 3, and then it was good! She was fantastic.”

“I rode her mother,  and we bred her, and the last show I did with her mother was here where she had a [career-ending] injury, so it was quite something for me to bring this one here,” she continues.  “When I crossed the finish line, I was just relieved that I paid justice to her mother, and to this one. Hooney has been a rocky road to our run here, but a lot of fellow riders  told me how special she was. A couple of times, I maybe wanted to give up, but I kept thinking it  would work one day. But I never expected her to be third  overnight after cross country!”

Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and Hooney d’Arville. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

What made Hooney tricky for so long was twofold: partly, it was a lack of focus, but also, more deeply-felt, it was an emotional pressure that cycled back and forth between horse and rider, Lara says.

“She wasn’t always logging the fences, and she was a bit spooky, so I don’t think she understood the rules of the game very easily. I was pregnant in the beginning of her career then afterwards a lot of things changed – she changed riders, from my groom, to [my husband] Kai here and there, to me,” she explains. “I think none of us were riding quite the same way. I also think I expected so much from her, because she was the daughter of Nooney Blue, and that wasn’t fair, maybe, in her development. I didn’t take her just as one of the horses I had in my yard – it needed to be this horse who needed to step up. So I think maybe [her being tricky], it was more my mistake.”

“But now I accept that she cannot be under too much pressure. I accept that she’s sometimes a bit spooky. I accept that she jogs in the walk, and I think because she feels I’m not getting upset she tries harder, while before it was just like, she thought, ‘anyway, she’s never happy with me!’ I don’t think I was ever not happy with her, but I think she disappointed me. I was much more emotional about her. The other horses, they’d jog, and I’d say, ‘okay, they jog. I go do the job, I finish, it’s fine’. I’ve got all the time in the world for them, whereas with her it was always  like, ‘why didn’t she do it right?’”

Now, though, Lara has learned to manage her own emotions and expectations, and together, the pair have forged a new level of trust and confidence in one another, which came well into play today when they powered through their slightly off-kilter start.

“Last year a rider fell off here at fence 2, and I did exactly the same mistake he did today and I was like ‘no, you’re not going to do this!’,” she laughs. “But then I think maybe it helped her, because fence 1 I’d overprotected her, maybe, and fence 2 I was like, now we’re going to go for it, and she went for it too much. But then, I thought she was just really paying attention to every question and also to my body language. She was excellent.”

Whatever happens tomorrow, Lara, who jumped the final fence in happy tears, says she’s “living her dream”, and has rediscovered her love for this level of the sport. Now, she’s eyeing up the next challenge – which, she says, she’d love to undertake at Maryland, but for the tricky scheduling clash with the Young Horse World Championships at Le Lion d’Angers.

“Right now, I really think I want to do five-stars again,” she says. “It took me a couple of years to really want to do it, and I enjoyed doing it today. This morning in the warm-up. I was so pale. I saw Julia Krajewski and I said, wwhy are we doing this?’ With the accident of Georgie [Campbell], and… I have two children, and I’m just wondering why I always put myself under so much pressure. But then you do this, and those emotions are just worth so much.”

Tom McEwen and CFH Cooliser. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Tom McEwen is down to one horse in this class after Brookfield Quality’s retirement, but his remaining ride, pathfinder CHF Cooliser, is in a very good place indeed: she sits fourth going into the final day, having added just 5.2 time penalties across the country to retain the place she held after dressage.

“Eliza started off really well – I know her pacing well and where she’s at, and actually, she just needed some bigger fences to help me roll on home a little bit. But she was smooth, she’s great, and she’s come home fantastic,” says Tom.

Setting off first today might not be everyone’s cup of tea, but Tom found it a useful asset for sharp Eliza, who benefited from the calm start.

“Sometimes it really helps with her actually – it  keeps her really relaxed,” he says. “No one has started, the tannoys haven’t revved up.  I actually managed to get on her and start the course without having to mount up in the start box!”

Burghley runners-up David Doel and Galileo Nieuwmoed delivered a characteristic masterclass across the country, looking smooth and rhythmic en route to delivering the fastest round of the day, some seventeen seconds inside the time. That’s moved them from first-phase 25^th to fifth, while last year’s third-place finishers, Yasmin Ingham and Rehy DJ, also came home inside the time to leap up from 28^th to sixth. Young British rising star Alice Casburn and her homebred, Topspin, moved up from 32^nd to seventh with their clear inside the time, too, and go into tomorrow’s finale laughing: they’re among the strongest jumpers in the field and have even tackled puissance classes together, so Luhmühlen’s notoriously big and tough showjumping track should be right in their wheelhouse.

It’s been a heck of a day for the Brits across the board in this class: eighth place is held overnight by Kirsty Chabert and Opposition Heraldik Girl, who added 4.8 time penalties to move from 26^th place after dressage.

Samantha Lissington and Lord Seekonig. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

British-based Kiwi Samantha Lissington and her five-star debutant Lord Seekonig were particularly impressive in the heavy rain, adding 8.8 time penalties to step up from 18^th to ninth, while Ireland’s Ian Cassells and Master Point round out the top ten, having added 10 time penalties and moved up four places.

Emily Hamel and Corvett. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Both US competitors completed the course: Emily Hamel and Corvett stepped up from 35^th to 16^th after adding 14.8 time penalties, while Katherine Coleman and Monbeg Senna slipped from 16^th to 31^st after picking up 20 penalties at the broad brush corner at 5C, and added 43.2 time penalties while battling some of the worst of the day’s weather.

Katherine Coleman and Monbeg Senna, somewhere in this rain cloud. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

There were plenty of surprises on Mike Etherington-Smith’s track today, which saw problems scattered evenly across the course and no one fence causing more than three issues. The most prominent drop was that of overnight runners-up Tom McEwen and Brookfield Quality, who didn’t complete, but problems popped up on course for several riders in contention: Laura Collett and Hester, third after dressage, dropped to 23^rd after picking up 20 penalties at fence 14A, the first of two angled brushes in the LeMieux water, as well as 20.8 time penalties, while local rider and overnight fifth-placed Nicolai Aldinger and Timmo were desperately unlucky to add 20 penalties to their tally at fence 26B, the final element of the last water complex and just moments from the finish line. They now sit 21^st. Compatriots Libussa Lübbeke and Caramia 34 dropped from 7^th to 19^th after activating a safety device at fence 10A, the upright rail at the coffin complex, and France’s Julie Simonet and Sursumcord’Or slipped from tenth to 19^th after adding 26 time penalties. Former Luhmühlen winner Mollie Summerland also dropped out of the top ten with her debutant Flow 7 when the leggy gelding had a green run-out in the main arena, but there was still much to celebrate: just three years into his eventing career, he looked every inch a five-star horse.

And so, we move into the tension of the final day, which will begin early doors tomorrow morning with the final horse inspection at 7.30 a.m. (6.30 a.m. BST/1.30 a.m. EST). Then, we’ll head into the five-star showjumping from 9.25 a.m. (8.25 a.m. BST/3.25 a.m. EST). There are 33 competitors left in the hunt, down from 42 who started the competition.

Keep it locked on EN for a full report coming soon from this afternoon’s CCI4*-S, which serves as an important final selection trial for the Olympics and was actually sunny. I promise not to write more than one sentence about that.

The top ten following cross-country in an influential – and deeply, deeply soggy – day of competition in Luhmühlen’s CCI5*.

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