Classic Eventing Nation

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

Thursday’s dressage at Pau is always a bit like a tapas plate of horse-dancing: because the horse inspection is held in the morning, and the French like a really, really long lunchbreak, just a smattering of horses and riders come forward for the first session in the afternoon. Today, that was 17 of our 49 combinations, but for a short-and-sweet session, it actually gave us a pretty comprehensive cross-section and overview of the field at large.

The primary takeaway? If you can nail every change, you’ll put yourself in a seriously strong position – and you’ll want to do that, because the judges aren’t really prepared to give away any freebies.

Just one of our seventeen pairs managed to break the 30 barrier, and even then only just: last to go Yasmin Ingham and her debutant mare Gypsie du Loir posted a 28.9 to give themselves a 2.5-point margin in their first test at this level.

“She’s just so laid-back and so relaxed, and it’s actually so nice to have one that feels very on the same page as you,” says Yaz of the ten-year-old, with whom she won Bramham’s CCI4*-S last season before stepping up to CCI4*-L with a top twenty finish at Boekelo.

Just one of the young mare’s flying changes marred their copybook, earning them 4s across the board in a scoresheet otherwise replete with 8s.

“Sometimes we could have been a bit more accurate in places, but I think that’s just her age showing slightly. She’s only ten, so to go in there and do a first five star — I’m really happy with our work in there today. And I think she was rewarded for her good bits, and then obviously there was a few bits that could have been a bit better that we’ll go home and work on for next year.”

Gypsie, who is the sole mare in Yaz’s stables, has been aimed at Pau as her target five-star throughout the season, while stablemate Goliath du Loir made his own debut at the level at Burghley last month, finishing sixth.

“I think they’re both very different horses,” says Yaz, who describes the mare as ‘a lovely character.’ “Goliath is more of an open, galloping up and down the terrain [type of horse]. You could really get stuck into that with him, whereas she’s like a little race car, and I feel like Pau is a kind of racetrack five star, so I think her acceleration will definitely gain her, hopefully, some speed on the cross country on Saturday. So that was why I chose here for her, and I hope I’ve made the right choice.”

Hallie Coon and Kapriccio. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

British-based US rider Hallie Coon and the former Julia Norman ride Kapriccio sit second overnight on a score of 31.4. This is the eleven-year-old’s second start at the level; his debut, at Luhmühlen in June, saw him finish fifth despite a pin on cross-country, and the pair come forward as one of several strong shouts for the win here this week – even if they start a touch behind their 27.8 on that occasion.

“I thought a little bit of tension creeped in, unfortunately, and we started off on a 6.5, so that never helps, but he was a good boy,” says Hallie. “He just got a little tense and sort of came against the bit a couple times, but I thought the quality of the work was much improved from Luhmühlen, especially the changes.”

It felt, she notes, “a little bit like they didn’t want to reward the good things, which is fine. That’s dressage. Obviously it left me a little bit disappointed, but I’m always happy with the horse, never disappointed with him. He was very good.”

Some four months on from Luhmühlen, the ‘weird character’ Kapriccio is “just a lot more trusting in the work, and trusting in the fact that I have his body really secure now. He knows what he’s doing. I think at Luhmühlen we were just sort of faking it and swinging every which way and trying to just get the change, let alone have any quality in it, so I think that’s a huge part of it. And then just being able to establish a really true three-beat canter has been really important for him, because he has a quite large irregular step, especially on the left lead, and so it’s just been really hard to accomplish throughness and collection and all of that with him, and in a really truthful way. So I think that’s really solidified, and that’s just sort of filtered through all the work. He’s really using muscles he never knew he had.”

Hallie, who began training with dressage coach Lisa White a few weeks before Luhmühlen and extolled her virtues then, has been hard at work with her in the months since – “she still holds both my hands,” she grins.

Bubby Upton and Cola. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Bubby Upton and the hugely experienced sixteen-year-old Cola are another partnership expected to put a 20s score on the board but they, too, suffered a touch of harsh marking – and some niggles in the changes — to earn themselves a 32.3, good enough for third overnight.

“He’s a sweet, sweet boy, and he was honestly fantastic,” says Bubby. “The changes have been a struggle throughout his career, and I felt like when he came up in his head before the first one it took me by surprise, and I maybe just backed off the next two too much. The last one was really good, but it was a bit of a shame and affected his mark from where we know it should have been.”

But, she continues, “the rest of the work was fantastic, and he was his usual self – so predictable and so reliable. It’s such a joy to have him still going at this age, and at our tenth five-star together.”

Bubby returns to Pau double-handed after a tricky week here twelve months ago, in which both Cola and second ride Its Cooley Time failed to complete the cross-country and the now-retired Cannavaro didn’t proceed to showjumping. This time, though, she’s determined to rewrite the story.

“We’re out for redemption,” Bubby says. “Last year was a really tough week in many aspects, and I really let down Its Cooley Time, who I feel like I deprived from a five-star win on his debut at the level, and Cola as well. I less so feel like it was a mistake on my part on Cola; it was one of those things where I struggled to turn him right, and I did the best I could. But obviously, the outcome on both was far from ideal. And yeah, we’re coming back this year with a vengeance. We’ve worked on a lot of things – with Its Cooley Time we’ve had to go back to the drawing board, and I really feel like now we’re in the best place we’ve been in. And hopefully, I can do him and Cola justice this week because they’re extraordinary horses. They’re obviously at different stages of their career, but both exceptional horses, and it’s on me to deliver for them.”

In the lead-up to this week’s five-star, Bubby has been campaigning to fundraise for the East Anglian Air Ambulance, who were a crucial part of the aftermath of a nearly career-ending fall she sustained in 2023. In doing so, she says, she’s been hit with a wave of extraordinary perspective.

“I don’t know where I begin with that charity,” she says. “I mean, standing here today, having done what I’ve done after my accident, often doesn’t feel real. And when I was doing the charity work in the run-up to this, I was rewatching back videos with them, and I was lucky enough to meet the crew that saved me. It’s honestly so surreal and puts everything into perspective. It made me relive it all again, which was just the most – this sounds weird, but kind of a magical experience. Because since the accident, you know, I’m going to enjoy every second that I have of the second chance, and it kind of really reignited that inside of me. And I feel like a test like today’s would have really annoyed me in the past because I did let him down in the changes. But in the grand scheme of things, we’re here at our 10th five-star together, and still being able to compete at five-star is something that was completely out the question three years ago. It’s pretty special.”

Izzy Taylor and Barrington Alice. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Another rider to have returned from time out with a renewed vigour is Britain’s Izzy Taylor, who comes to Pau triple-handed after missing much of the season with a badly broken leg. That time off certainly hasn’t seen her accumulate any rust or dust, though: she sits fourth overnight with the five-star debutant Barrington Alice, with whom she scored a smart 33 to slot in ahead of fellow countrymen Willa Newton and Hartacker, a former ride of Izzy’s, who are fifth on 33.4.

“She’s a very cool person,” says Izzy of Barrington Alice, who was the Six-Year-Old World Champion in 2023. “I wouldn’t have her here if she didn’t have that mentality towards life – she’s a real trier, which we need, but also very relaxed and wants to do it right. I’ve had her since she was a four-year-old and I think that counts for a lot, too: we really trust each other, and I love her.”

Izzy, who had her accident in March, was back competing by July – but it was an uphill battle to get there.

“I did and am still doing a lot of rehab, and I’m working really hard at it. Luckily I like a challenge, because it was a challenge: I couldn’t do anything, I wasn’t allowed to walk and I was non-weight-bearing for a long time. To be back some months later at a five-star with three horses is a big ask – of course I question it, but I question everything, because if you don’t, you’re not in the right place as a sportsperson. I’m really excited to be here with three very different horses, and of course I could have not been here or just come with one or two, but they’re on great form and I’m on form, and we’ve got to take advantage of that.”

Tomorrow’s full dressage day will begin at 10.00 a.m. local time (9.00 a.m. BST/4.00 a.m. EST) and will see our remaining 32 horses and riders come forward to produce their tests. As always, we’ll be back with an in-depth look at the stories of the day, and to follow along live, you can tune in to Pau’s dedicated streaming service.

Until then: Go Eventing!

The top ten after Thursday’s truncated first day of dressage at Pau.

Les Etoiles de Pau: Website | Entries + Live Scoring | Live Stream | EN’s Coverage

Noor Slaoui and Cash in Hand represent Morocco in this week’s five-star. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

And so we meet again, Les Etoiles de Pau: the final five-star of the season; the end of our European reporting line-up for the year; always, indisputably, one of the weirdest and most wonderful events of the year. There’ll be men in horse suits, 18^th-century royals on stilts, more €3 wine than any of us know what to do with, enormous rats in the water complex – but before all that, there’s today’s hugely busy first day of competition, which began with the first horse inspection.

49 of the 50 horses entered into the competition have been accepted by the ground jury of James Rooney (IRL), Laure Eslan (FRA), and Judy Hancock (GBR) in an inspection that was, for the most part, completely sans hiccups. It wasn’t until the final two horses that anything other than quick acceptances happened, but before everyone assembled could drift off to the bar for an aperitif, both Alexa Gartenberg’s Cooley Kildaire and Julie Wolfert’s SSH Playboy were sent to visit the holding box vet.

Julie Wolfer and SSH Playboy. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Both returned to re-present, but just one would proceed to the competition. We bid a sad adieu to Kansas’s Wolfert, who had intended to make her five-star debut this week with the Rebecca Farms CCI4*-S winner SSH Playboy, with whom she’d orchestrated an extraordinary comeback from a hairline fracture of the fetlock sustained a couple of years ago. The pair have been based with French Olympian Astier Nicolas over the last ten days and while we know they’ve had an incredible trip so far, hacking through the historic villages and beaches of France, it’s a particularly heartbreaking early finish to a trip that’s been so long-awaited. We hope to see them back on this side of the pond soon.

“She hasn’t even started yet!” Alexa Gartenberg and Francesca Pollara on mum-calming duties after re-inspection. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

For Alexa, though, it was a happy acceptance to her own five-star debut, which compelled her mother to floods of – understandable – tears. We’ll see them return to the main arena on Friday for their dressage test.

And it was dry! A thrill.

Look, I know it’s not very interesting or very original to talk about the weather. I get it. But Pau, in recent years, has been truly plagued by a case of the Octobers – none of us will soon forget the deluge of 2024, which resulted in several minutes and a huge swathe of fences being cut from a course that was almost entirely submerged under several inches of water – and every time the black clouds roll in off the Pyrenees, they bring with it an innate sense of the Jaws theme song. Wednesday was okay, as long as you weren’t driving down from Bordeaux, in which case it very much was not fine and felt a bit like trying to steer through a year’s worth of rain in an hour. Wednesday evening we got another dumping. Today – who knows? So far, though, we look on track to actually have our Thursday afternoon dressage session, which is more than we managed last year when a swift schedule change was necessitated. When’s the off-season, again?

Jonelle Price and Capitaine de Hus Z. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

More interesting, probably, than the weather is the field at this final CCI5* of 2026. Where many events of this level have bemoaned smaller-than-usual line-ups this season, Pau is actually pretty well-subscribed and certainly not lacking in any quality. The field of 50 horses and riders covers ten nations and features two previous winners – Grappa Nera for Jonelle Price, who won in 2022, and Jarillo for Tim Price, who took the title last year. The Prices, for what it’s worth, represent 12% of the field: each has brought three horses in a strong bid to keep the trophy in the family in 2026.

Hallie Coon and Kapriccio. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

Notable beyond the Kiwi contingent are several of this year’s Luhmühlen all-stars, including runners-up Emily King and Valmy Biats and fifth-placed Hallie Coon and Kapriccio, who lead a small but exciting US contingent here this week that also includes Olympian Tiana Coudray and Cancaras Girl, who led day one of dressage at Badminton this spring. Also flying the stars and stripes is intrepid first-timer Alexa Gartenberg, who has been based in the UK for the last few seasons with Kevin McNab and will pilot Cooley Kildaire this week.

Emily King and Valmy Biats. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

This might as well be a satellite British five-star for the relative size of the country’s entry list here: 22 of the 50 starters are Brits, and several of the represent strong chances of a win bid. Beyond Emily King and Valmy Biats there’s a smart entry from 2022 World Champion Yasmin Ingham, whose debutant Gypsie du Loir won the CCI4*-S at Bramham this summer; Bramham’s CCI4*-L winners, Bubby Upton and Its Cooley Time return after a tricky week twelve months ago and are accompanied by stablemate Cola; former winner Ros Canter has young upstart MHS Seventeen in the mix; and after missing much of the season with an injury, Izzy Taylor returns with a vengeance with three rides.

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

Switzerland’s two-time five-star winner Felix Vogg is also double-horsed, with Maryland champion Cartania heading his charge, while France’s bid is arguably helmed by Benjamin Massie, who brings Figaro Fonroy – a top ten finisher at last year’s European Championships, but a shock non-finisher when pathfinding for France at this summer’s World Championships – for the eleven-year-old’s level debut.

The week’s competition begins in earnest in just a few hours’ time at 14.30 local time (13.30 BST/8.30 a.m. EST), when 17 horses and riders will deliver their dressage tests in a short afternoon session. Our first in the ring will be Jonelle Price and Grappa Nera, our 2022 champions, and we’ll wrap up with Yasmin Ingham and Gypsie du Loir in the ring at 16.42 (15.42 BST/10.42 a.m. EST). If you’re following along from the US, your first opportunity to cheer on the stars and stripes will come at 16.07 (15.07 BST/10.07 EST) when Hallie Coon and Kapriccio head down the centre line. You can find the times in full here, and you can follow all the action live via Pau’s dedicated streaming service, available here. Join us later for an analysis and interviews with the key movers and shakers of day one here in the south of France. Allons-y, and Go Eventing!

Les Etoiles de Pau: Website | Entries + Live Scoring | Live Stream | EN’s Coverage