GREAT BRITAIN THIRD IN GIJON 5* NATIONS CUP
Saturday 01 September 2012
Great Britain took third place in the CSIO5* Nations Cup competition in Gijon, Spain earlier today, Saturday 1st September.
Fielding a team of mostly new horses to 5* Nations Cup level the result was a promising one for Great Britain; still fresh from winning Team Gold at the London 2012 Olympics. The hard fought third place served to highlight both the equine talent coming through, in addition to the talent emerging from Young Rider level into senior team competition.
With thirteen nations coming forward, each fielding a team of four where the best three results count, the course took its toll with many nations notching up penalties well into double figures.
Only six clear rounds were achieved throughout the competition, one of which was produced by Essex based Dan Neilson whotook the role of team pathfinder on Varo M, owned by Stacey Willsone. His performance was all the more notable as this was his first appearance on a 5* Nations Cup team. Narrowly, missing out on replicating their zero penalty score in the second round they incurred 4 penalties when a fence fell.
Nottingham based Joe Clayton, another rider alongside Dan who is fresh out of Young Riders, was next to go with Mr Darcy owned by Jes Nielson. A total of 18 penalties meant they became the drop score in round one, but his second round saw a marked improvement with just 4 penalties being accrued.
Laura Renwick, from Essex with Roller Coaster owned by Marian and John Renwick were third to go for the team. Just touching two fences in the first round saw the combination incur 8 penalties – a penalty score that was also matched in round two.
John Whitaker with Maximillian IV owned by his wife Clare had an unlucky touch at a fence to incur 4 penalties to which a time fault was added as a result of coming through the finish just outside the time allowed. Their second round saw 10 penalties allotted making them the drop score for round two.
After the first round Italy had looked set to be the leaders with their 2 penalty score with France just behind them on 5 penalties. Great Britain had sat in 4th place on 13 penalties, just 1 penalty behind the Ukraine. However the second round saw a reversal of places with France securing pole position on a total finish score of 13 penalties, Italy on 19 penalties and Great Britain moving up a place into third on 29 penalties a fence ahead of the Ukraine.
The event continues through till Monday 3rd September when the last and biggest class of the show takes place, the Banco Herrero Gran Premieo which takes place at 16:00hrs local time.
For full results and further information on the show please visit http://hipico.gijon.es/
The British Showjumping teams are strongly supported by the UK Sport Lottery Funded BEF World Class Programme.
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