Will and Twizzel
Will Coleman and Twizzel of the USA took the lead in the Barbury CIC3* on Friday afternoon, half-way through the nearly 120 3* dressage rides. The cool thing is that Will’s test had a couple of bobbles in it and I know that Twizzel can score even better. The Barbury competition is some of the best in the world because it is the major event for the British 4* horses to start up again after their spring three-day breaks. Will’s plan is to keep Twizzel in Great Britain through Burghley. Perhaps more impressive than his score is that Will took the lead today from William Fox-Pitt and Navagator. We still have a full day of dressage to go Saturday, including William’s Cool Mountain, and there were quite a few great horses left to go Friday afternoon when we headed back to Julian Stiller’s Headley Stud farm. But, however the leader board is looking going into the jumping, Will stepped up big with his performance today.
[Barbury Friday Scores, Barbury Scoring Website–Click ‘Section A CIC’ for scores]
–When we left at about 3:00pm local time, William and Navigator were still in second with a 46.0. William had a lovely test, as always. Our US readers will remember Navigator finishing 23rd at Rolex in 2009. Since then he has finished 2nd and Pau last year and 15th at Badminton this year.
–Will Faudree and Andromaque were the other US pair to ride in the CIC3* today. Will felt that Andromaque’s test took a step back from her performance in the 3* at Luhmuhlen. Missie was a bit tense, which will attributed to the rain and missing a few rides on her this week while he was at the test event.
–Tiana Coudray also left the CIC2* dressage with Ringwood Magister feeling as though she didn’t have her best test. Finian warmed up partly next to the cross-country, which got him a bit wound up and the sleeting rain during their warm up probably didn’t help either. One way or another, dressage isn’t the important phase for Missie or Finian at this event.
–Will is keeping Twizzel over here until Burghley and will be commuting back and forth to keep his program running smoothly back in the states. Will talks about his travel plans and thanks thanks Twizzel’s owner, Mr. James Wildasin, as well as our host Julian Stiller in his post-dressage interview. My apologies to Will for doing the interview facing him right into a rare moment of bright sun:
–The Barbury setting is unbelievably perfect for eventing. The event is built on an estate in a large bowl of land. The trailer (lorry) parking, temporary stabling, trade fair, and dressage arenas are built on one side of the bowl and the cross-country course is built on the other side, meaning that everyone at the event can see most of the cross-country course from anywhere.
–My guess is that Barbury would be the second largest event in North America, behind Rolex, in terms of trade fair scale and general ‘big event’ feel. I would guess there are around 30 vendor tents and 5 food trailers, there is a massive sponsors tent with a public bar, and I counted 5 dressage arenas. But the ‘big event’ feel was juxtaposed with a sense of calm and quiet throughout the day. Perhaps it was because very few spectators braved the cold and rainy weather, or perhaps the wind muffled the sound, or perhaps it was just that everyone seemed to know exactly what they were doing, but Barbury felt very calm–for lack of a better word–compared to your average CIC3* in the US.
–The novice (US prelim) divisions did dressage, cross-country, and show jumping all today. The CIC2* and CIC3* just did dressage. The CIC3* has 120 competitors so they will do another day of dressage tomorrow followed by a big show jumping Sunday morning. The cross-country runs Sunday afternoon in reverse order of placing and my guess is Sunday will be when the spectators show up in big numbers.
–Speaking of trailer parking, there are no trailers in England. Everyone uses lorrys here, whereas only a few people use them in the States–for example, Allison bought Phillip’s old white lorry. For the uninitiated, lorries are like RVs except the front half is living/tack area and the back half have angled horse stalls. Like anything, lorrys come in varying degrees of size and awesomness, but we spent the day working out of the Headley Stud lorry, which is absolutely amazing. Everyone over here says lorrys are better than trailers with living quarters, but I think it is a matter of preference. Lorrys are easier to drive and incredibly convenient and space efficient. But, you can’t unhook a truck from a trailer so you are instantly obligated to have two vehicles.
–I’m quite convinced that I will never get used to the feeling of how exiting it is to stand in a warmup with Mark Todd, William Fox-Pitt, Mary King, Oliver Townend, Tina Cook, and a ton of other great riders circling around. It’s impossible to pick just one to focus on and watch.
–I walked the cross-country course with Coleman and Faudree and I was surprised by how twisty and hilly the course is. It almost feels like Greenwich Park all over again, except there are no trees and the ropes make very wide galloping lanes–they are just placed to prevent collisions. The footing is almost perfect and we could barely hear the ‘novice’ horses galloping.
–I videoed 4 rides today: Tiana, Will Faudree, Will Coleman, and William Fox-Pitt. When we left this afternoon two of them were in the top two. I’m going to start charging and EN Karma fee to video people.
–The old joke is that if you don’t like the weather in England, wait 5 minutes. That held true today and a miserable morning of showers gave way to a beautiful afternoon of partly cloudy skies. The only constant was the wind.
I want to give a huge shout-out to Julian Stiller and Headley Stud for putting me up this weekend, letting me ride to and from Barbury in the aforementioned lorry, and for general awesomeness. We have two more amazing days of British eventing Saturday and Sunday left on our Eventing Nation British tour. Until then, go eventing.
