Kim Severson and Paddy lead Bromont CCI3* by 7.8 after XC

(1) Kim Severson and Tipperary Liadhand jumped around clean and fast enough to keep their lead from the dressage.  It’s absolutely no surpise that Kim and Paddy got around, right now, they are one of the few US pairs that we can count on for a clean XC ride.

(2) 9 of the 29 CCI3* starters had problems on the course.  By far, the jump that caused the most issues was #5B, a corner after a table.  The line walked in 4, but it came up early on the course and just after the first water.

Fence 5A and B:

(3) Martha McDowell fell from Gaelic Marriage at fence #8B, a skinny out of the first coffin.  Initial reports over the radio were scary but Martha soon got to her feet.  Martha was transported to a local hospital.  I spoke with the EMT who tended to Martha and he told me that she would likely be fine, but she might have an orbital fracture, which is a fracture to one of the bones around the eye.  Gaelic Marriage walked back to the barn.  Overall, it seems like today was a success from a safety standpoint.

(4) Jessica Phoenix and Exponential jumped from 12th to 2nd on the only double-clear in the CCI3*.  Exponential was a touch strong, but as I wrote yesterday, the horse is a jumping machine and made most of the course look easy.  No one else made the time but Jessica was 31 seconds under it.  Jessica also had the second fastest ride of the day, collecting just 0.8 time penalties with Exploring, but that ride included a stop, dropping Exlporing to 14th place.

(5) Canada also got a strong performance from Rebecca Howard and Riddle Master, who jumped from 9th to 4th on 4.8 time penalties.  Rebecca had one of the smoothest and overall best looking rides of the day.  Exponential and Riddle Master should be in the running for the ‘best conditioned horse’ award because they finished full of running.  

(6) Canada started the event with 5 riders in the CCI3* and two of them are in the top four after XC.  Halfway through 2010, the emergence of Canada as an eventing force is one of this year’s big stories.

(7) Will Coleman had one of the best rides of the day on Nevada Bay.  He gave Nevada Bay a very educational ride around the horse’s first CCI3* and Nevada Bay officially goes on the EN “horses of the future” list.  

(8) Only two of the US WEG applicants at Bromont finished the day.  Heidi White and Northern Spy were eliminated.  Geoff (the announcer) explained that they had a refusal at #17B, and that they jumped #17A again but not #17B.  In my XC preview post I mentioned that the #17B option was on #17A and vice versa, so my guess is that they jumped the A option on #17B and then carried on.  Buck retired Cruise Lion at the troublesome corner at #5B.

(9) The weather: I’d like to extend a personal thank you to Mother Nature for keeping us dry on Saturday.

(10) The course: Derek di Grazia deserves a lot of credit for the courses here at Bromont.  The challenge for course designers these days is to make the XC relevant (challenging) but safe.  With 30% of CCI3* riders having issues, the Bromont course was just that today.  Derek is becoming one of the names in course design.

(11) All three of the three-star riders we did video interviews with yesterday (Kim, Ashley Kehoe, Rebecca Howard) had clean rides today, and all of them are in the top 10.  EN Karma is hard at work!

The barns are busy with walking, icing, and grazing.  Depending on how I feel after dinner, we may have evening post from Bromont later, which will undoubtedly be packed with much ridiculousness.

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