Yasmin Ingham and Banzai du Loir. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
It’s as much of a treat for eventing fans to get to watch World Champions Yasmin Ingham and Banzai du Loir as it is for the talented pair to ride in the most prestigious competitions in the world – and certainly, the young rider is as well known for her gratitude for these opportunities as she is for her extraordinary abilities in the saddle. And where gratitude is given room to flourish, so, too, is grace under pressure, even when things might go a bit pear-shaped – as they did for the pair at Kentucky this spring. They returned to the five-star a year after taking second in the French-bred gelding’s debut there, but after being held indefinitely at the start box, Banzai dropped off the boil just a touch, and they had a shock early run-out before regrouping and going on to finish the competition in fine style.
Now, they’re back at a major competition, and neither looks ruffled by what may be seen as a crucial opportunity to prove themselves ahead of this summer’s European Championships, for which they’ll be hoping for selection. Nor do the British powers-that-be seem concerned: they’ve put the pair in the hugely pressurised anchor slot for the team this week, which means they’ll be the last Brits to head out of the start box and, as such, will need to be prepared to save the day if one of their teammates has a tricky round.
There’s cool under pressure, though, and then there’s this girl. Riding in the final session of today’s dressage, Yas and Banzai danced their way to the lead on a sparkling score of 23.5 – though the margins are so tight today, even with tough marking across the board and an extraordinary number of people sitting in the 30-32 zone, that they’ve got less than a penalty in hand going into today’s showjumping.
“It’s amazing to be here – I feel very, very lucky, and it’s just so special to be at this sort of calibre of event, especially with my number one boy Banzai,” says Yas. “It’s amazing to be able to show him off on a stage again – and obviously, it’s been a couple of months since Pratoni, so it’s so nice to bring him to these big shows. When he performs like that it’s… well, I’m pretty speechless, to be honest!”
Yasmin Ingham and Banzai du Loir. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
Though their test was without errors, Yas still quickly picked out areas that she’d like to improve on for their next outing: “He was really great out in the warm-up, and then just went slightly flat in there. I probably could have had a little bit more tempo and cadence in the trot, and a couple of his changes needed to be a little bit more expressive, but I can’t be too disappointed with that! But obviously, I’m a perfectionist and I like things to be as good as they can be.”
Though she’d been able to see the harsh marking all throughout the competition, which had several riders wondering what the judges were looking for, exactly, Yas stuck to the plan she’s developed with her coaches in order to lay down the marks.
“I try and stick to the way that I know, that myself and Chris Bartle and Richard Davidson have created to get the best out of him,” she says. “I think we just try and stick with that trend, really. It’s worked before in the past, so we try and keep everything fairly similar with his prep and the work in and then obviously going into the ring, we try and ride the test for maximum marks.”
Now, there’s the small matter of tonight’s showjumping – and tomorrow’s cross-country – to deal with.
“There’s absolutely no catching up to be done at the end of the cross-country,” she says. “I think you really need to be up on those minutes early on. Time will be of the essence tomorrow, and here’s some tricky technicla questions scattered around the course. But I like how in the main field, there’s two quite big opportunities to have a good gallop and ride away from your fences quickly and make up a bit of time there and I’m very lucky to be sat on a big rangy, galloping horse so I’m going to try and make the most of those big stretches and then hopefully we’ll be there or there abouts with the time
Tom McEwen and JL Dublin. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
Further bolstering British team efforts is Tom McEwen, also returning to the world stage after a trip to Kentucky this spring with the former Nicola Wilson ride, reigning European Champion JL Dublin. The pair very nearly managed to take the lead, but as they had been at Kentucky, they were just pipped at the post by Yas and Banzai, and had to settle for a close second place on their score of 24.3.
“I thought, apart from the first halt, that he was so relaxed and in harmony and absolutely loving what he was doing in there – so he was a pleasure to ride, to be honest,” says Tom. “We both had great fun; he’s loving the show, and he definitely enjoyed the appreciation from the crowd afterwards. He’s a truly special horse.”
Tom has had the ride on ‘Dubs’ for less than a full year, but today, they got the chance to revisit the early part of the partnership and evaluate how much they’ve progressed.
“Funnily enough, we did this test at Boekelo when I’d first got him,” he says, recalling the Dutch event in October, where they finished second on the same score as the winners. “Now, I’ve started to understand him, and we’ve really gelled – which is thanks, obviously, to Nicola and all her hard work. All that hard work she’s put in is really paying off.”
Tom, who finished third here last year with Toledo de Kerser, is prepared for a totally different challenge in tomorrow’s cross-country finale.
“It’s very different to last year,” says Tom. “There’s some real galloping sections with no fences, and then some places like the first water, where we’re doing circles within the water. It’ll be really interesting to see how it rides – we might find that it’s a little easier to get the time, but we might also find that it’s a lot harder.”
Michael Jung and fischerChipmunk FRH. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
It’s not often we don’t see Michael Jung in the lead here, particularly when he brings out the big guns – which Olympic mount and five-star winner fischerChipmunk FRH most definitely qualifies as. But although the pair trended in the top spot for part of their test, and then flitted, occasionally, into second, a late miscommunication and several subsequent erroneous transitions just moments before the final centreline proved expensive, and the 5s and 4s they earned their pushed their score to a still very respectable 24.4. That sees them head into showjumping in third place, just a tenth of a penalty behind Tom and JL Dublin.
Tim Price and Falco. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
The last rider in the ring this afternoon put a pin in a seriously smart final session: Kiwi anchors Tim Price and Falco, who were victorious at Pau’s CCI5* in 2021, and took individual bronze at the World Championships last year, took hold of fourth place provisionally with a score of 26. But though the quirky 14-year-old delivered all the right kinds of dance move in his test, the moment his final halt and salute was behind him, his inner wild-child came out, and Tim cantered back out of the arena laughing at the gelding’s much-improved sense of timing.
“In contrast to that, though, his work in his test was some of his softest, most on-side work I’ve had with him,” says Tim. “I think that’s the mark of a proper good horse – he tries so hard, and he does everything through partnership and training, and if I stick closely to that in the ring, then as soon as he has a moment to take in his surroundings, he’s like, ‘woah!’ He becomes very sharp.”
Though the horse is in his mid-teens, he’s a type that looks as though he’s improving year on year – and Tim agrees that he’s a classic late bloomer, as so many sharp-brained horses are.
“I said to [groom] Kerryn [Edmans] on the way over, he’s got quite a lot of old man qualities, and I think he’s going to be a very cool old man, actually, in a couple of years,” laughs Tim. “He’s starting to just go through the motions of the job; he knows where we are in the week, and when the right occasion comes – he knows where to put his flamboyance now a bit more.”
This is Falco’s third trip to Aachen, and Tim’s hoping that it’ll be a case of third time lucky – because previously, it hasn’t gone quite to plan for the gelding.
“The first time it blew his mind; the second time, it was a little better – but we got stuck on the keyhole on cross-country,” remembers Tim. “So we’ll see! The course has been stiffened up this year; it’s bigger, and there’s a couple of places with proper questions that have to be ridden in a certain way. It’s always nice to have a contingency plan B and C, but there’s a couple here where there’s really only one way to make it work well – though I’m sure we’ll see a few versions! The Kiwis are good at being underdogs, so I’m sure we’ll go out and give it a good go.”
Tamie Smith and Mai Baum. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
Kentucky winners Tamie Smith and Mai Baum return for their first outing since that momentous win, and will go into showjumping sitting in fifth place – and best of the US team – on a 26.9. While fans of the 17-year-old German-bred gelding will recognise that the score awarded isn’t on even keel with his usual low-20s efforts, Tamie explains that that’s because she’s trying some new tactics in the ring – and those led to some visible early tension, which she deftly rode through.
“I felt wild,” she says with a laugh. “I’m trying to leave a little bit to chance and I had bobbles because of it, but I’m on the right track – I think he’s more in front of me and not just hovering around, which is where I think he loses points. So I experimented a little bit to see, and the beginning was a little frazzled: when he’s tense, he starts throwing one front leg a bit unevenly, but he has to just learn to push and engage, so I went for it and had mistakes, but I’m happy with him.”
Even the most consistent of performers can have days when the buzz of the situation bubbles over, and ‘Lexus’ felt that today – and when he does, Tamie says, it’s not always a straightforward job to get him back on terra firm. Instead, it’s all about the fine art of compromise — and the slimmest of margins – especially in the fishbowl of the Deutsches Bank Stadium.
“He’s a funny horse – he’s awkwardly hot and sensitive but then he’s also behind me,” she says. “It’s a weird mix of knowing how much is enough or not enough, and it’s millimetre by millimetre; I just kind of corrected him a little bit, more maybe too much. But that’s the sport – they’re pretty electric in there. He halted before I went to go in, and he reared, and he doesn’t ever do that. So he was just feeling it in there. It feels very closed in and claustrophobic, and I think it’s hard on a horse with movement, who needs room to move. They feel like they’re getting swallowed up a bit.”
Liz Halliday-Sharp and Miks Master C. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
Liz Halliday-Sharp and Miks Master C, who she rides for Ocala Horse Properties and Debbie Palmer, find themselves in sixth place after earning a 27.3 – a score that the rider felt didn’t quite reflect the horse’s work in the ring. Nevertheless, she was delighted that the talented gelding’s rideability – an ongoing work in progress – continued to head in the right direction, despite the challenging, compact stadium setting of this first phase.
“I was really pleased with him; he’s still a relatively young, inexperienced horse,” she says. “He’s only eleven, and we’ve only been together a year so I’m happy. This would probably be the most challenging ring he’s been in, so I had to ride what I had a little bit, but I was very, very pleased with him. The scoring has been really tough, so I obviously came here hoping for a better mark because he’s a really talented horse, but there’s plenty to do still and he did a lot of great things in there.”
Though Mikki has certainly seen atmosphere before – he finished third at Kentucky on his five-star debut this spring, and so logged plenty of time in that venue’s sprawling stadium – Aachen, Liz explains, has a very different feel.
“I think it’s very tight. It’s very closed in – they feel really like the whole stand is on top of them. But he was actually fabulous, and he didn’t really react to it that much,” she says.
Mikki’s a horse that’s firmly on the Paris pathway, and every outing gives Liz a chance to revisit his educational checklist and work on the marginal gains that’ll help him peak at the perfect moment.
“I think he still just needs more strength,” she says. “He offers a lot and when he gets a little tired in the ring he gets a little strong on me, so I have to just keep working away and training him. I need about another six months and then we’ll really have it where we need it, but but he’s got a lot to come still. We have a lot more of a partnership now and I definitely know him better, and I’ve changed what I’m doing as a result: I’ve got him back in a snaffle because I just wanted to try and go there. So we’re kind of working through that a little bit, but everything is so much more solidified than it was – and there’s still another level to come, which is actually exciting. I believe he’s capable of doing a sub-20s test – he’s a gorgeous horse, and I’ve just got to keep plugging away.”
Will Coleman and Off The Record. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
In 2021, they rose to the top spot here and became the first-ever American winners of CHIO Aachen – and this year, Will Coleman and Off The Record are back, another year older and wiser, for their third consecutive visit to this German crown jewel. And the great news? They’re only getting better. They sit seventh going into showjumping on a smart score of 28.1, which continues a trajectory of improvement from the 29.7 they posted in the year that they won, and the 28.5 they put on the board last year, which helped them to an eventual sixth place.
The German team, currently sitting in bronze position on the podium, is helped along enormously by the efforts of 2022 Blenheim CCI4*-L champions Malin Hansen-Hotopp and the expressive Carlitos Quidditch K, who sit eighth on 28.9, while the day’s pathfinders, young Warendorf trainees and German individuals Libussa Lübbeke and Caramia 34, hold onto ninth on 29.5. Tenth place is held by Australia’s Kevin McNab on his relatively new ride, the former Caroline Harris mount Miss Pepperpot, who earned a 30.2 with a sweet, workmanlike effort in the ring.
Phillip Dutton and Z. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
Phillip Dutton sits 24th at the end of the first phase, having posted a 32.8 with his experienced Olympic mount, Z.
“I was hoping for better score,” he admits, “but I was really pleased with the way the way Z went — he went in the ring and was very workmanlike, which is rewarding.”
Despite their long partnership and extraordinary wealth of shared experience, Phillip explains that scenarios such as Aachen, with its combination of atmosphere and team pressure, can still throw challenges, curveballs, and chances to learn and improve in the pair’s direction.
“You’re constantly trying to improve and understand what he’s going through, and how to get him there and to be at his best, and so it’s always a balance of making sure he’s not going to be too fresh and too on edge, but then still having plenty of pizzazz and plenty of activity and sparkle in the test,” he says. “I thought I got it about right, but when you go a bit early [in the day], you’re trying to figure out what the judges are actually looking for as well. So maybe I should have gone for a little bit more and made it a little bit more expressive.”
Though his first-phase score might feel a touch disappointing, as a hugely decorated stalwart of the sport, Phillip is all too aware that the competition doesn’t end in this stadium – and both phases yet to come pose significant challenges, beginning with tonight’s showjumping in the 40,000 capacity stadium.
“Jumping in that main arena is a little bit different for us, because it’s such a big, expansive arena,” he says. “So we have to be on our game there, and then cross country is an interesting track. There are galloping patches, but then there’s quite intense patches where the time is going to be very influential. At a lot of the events you just try to stay on your minute markers, whereas here, some parts you’re going to be way up on your minute markers, but some minutes you’re going to be way down. It’s going to be interesting, and you’ll need a horse that’s really adjustable, but fast and obviously brave. The challenges keep going right through to the end.”
Dan Krietl and Carmango. Photo by Tilly Berendt.
US individual competitor Dan Krietl is having one heck of a summer: the CCI4*-L National Champion hadn’t competed in Europe – nor, in fact, even visited – before this year, but now, he’s practically an honorary resident after having flown over a couple of weeks ahead of Luhmühlen with Carmango. First, they logged some valuable training with their hosts, Belgium’s Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and her husband, Germany’s Kai-Steffen Meier, at their home base, Arville; then, they moseyed on over to Germany to tackle the CCI4*-S at Luhmühlen, which is one of the toughest and most hotly-contested events of the level on the continent. That didn’t quite go to plan – a battle of wills against a seriously influential double of angled hedges in the arena led to the hard decision to retire – but if education is the name of the game this year, then he’s collecting a wealth of the stuff, all of which he hopes will pay off in the long run as he continues to develop his talented young horse.
“I was so disappointed out in Luhmühlen, because I’ve never had a stop with him in his whole career,” says Dan. “He’s just gotten a little spookier and sharper over here – partly, I think, because I switched his feed and didn’t realise it’s, like, jet fuel for horses!”
That, he explains, created a bit of a perfect storm when the horse met the busy arena, its two angled hedges, and, crucially, the water trays beneath them: “He’s a little spooky with liverpools, and that jump scenario will be hard to recreate. But I also I think I’ll plan to ride a little ‘be ready’ here, and if he wants to look or spook, I’ll say, ‘Boy, you can get in there and do it.’ Normally, he actually loves the job. If you point him he’s going to jump, no matter what, and so maybe I took it for granted a little too much. I’ve just got to be ready to give him a good ride.”
That lesson isn’t the only valuable intel Dan’s picked up since coming over – he’s also been refining this first phase, and though today’s score of 34.8, which puts him 31st after dressage, doesn’t necessarily reflect a huge change on paper since Luhmühlen, Dan can feel the gains being made.
“We’ve worked a lot on his dressage and just improving the basics — that throughness, and kind of putting a few pieces back together. I feel like the horse is going better here this weekend,” he says. “I was really proud of him; he tried so hard. I messed up the first flying change, so I’m disappointed about that, but the rest of it, we didn’t really have mistakes, and so I was really happy with that. I think we’re improving from Luhmuhlen — our score wasn’t much better, but the coach and everybody thought we’re moving in the right direction, and for a ten-year-old and in the atmosphere, I was really happy.”
Dan’s been trying a unique tactic to get ready for this evening’s second phase, which takes place in the unique and enormous main stadium: “I’ve been walking the 1.60m jumping courses,” he laughs, “because then, I’m hoping ours might look small!”
The individual top ten after the first phase of competition.
Their extraordinary first-phase efforts put the British team in the lead going into jumping, though they’ve not quite got a rail in hand: with their aggregate score of 78.8, they’re 3.5 points ahead of second placed team USA on 82.3, who themselves are just 2.1 penalties ahead of third-placed Germany on 84.4. From there, the margins get a bit wider – fourth placed New Zealand is 5.9 penalties behind Germany, which puts them 11.5 penalties – or two rails and just over eight seconds – off the lead.
Now, with the first phase behind us, we meet one of CHIO Aachen’s great anomalies: we’re not done for the day, because there’s showjumping yet to come tonight in the extraordinary main stadium here. That’ll begin at 17.45 local time (that’s 16.45 BST/11.45 a.m. EST), and will run in the same order as this morning – that is, individuals first, and then in rotations through the team draw. You can find the order of go here, and to tune in to watch the action live, click here. We’ll be bringing you further news on all the movers and shakers later on this evening, plus plenty of photos of our stars of the sport in action. Until then: Go Eventing!
The team standings after the first phase.
EN’s Coverage of CHIO Aachen is brought to you with support from Kentucky Performance Products and Ocala Horse Properties.
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