Shropshire Area win the National Team Jumping Championship
Sunday 12 August 2018
.JPG "Shropshire Area win the National Team Jumping Championship")
In the National Team Jumping Championship on Day 6 of competition here at the British Showjumping National Championships 2018, horses and riders had travelled from all around the UK to contest the final. The winning team was Shropshire with team captain Ceri Williams and team manager Sian Hinkins.
A total of eight teams went into the jump off where one rider from each team goes in to represent their team. Ceri Williams, who was also celebrating her birthday today, was the selected rider to go into the jump off and won on a time of 38.02 seconds. Ceri said of her mare Dellrose Rosie; “She is extremely quick and she trusted her to go round clear."
The Shropshire team have been trying to win the final for the past three years so to qualify this year and to take the title is a great achievement and they said: “It feels amazing to be at BSNC and it is a dream come true to have won here today; I can’t explain how much it means to us!”
Ceri’s team mates, who call themselves ‘The girls who like to shamrock’, consisted of: Helen Pugh, Gemma Dennis and Lucy Blumberg. Ceri is the longest standing team member having been a part of it for three years. Gemma has been a part of it for two years and Lucy and Helen are both on their first year of team jumping. The team qualified for the National Championships in May after only riding together for a couple months.
As Ceri and Gemma have both been to BSNC before, they said: “We were able to be more tactical this year as we understood how important each round was. However, in the end it didn’t really matter as we all jumped amazing clear rounds. The ground was really good and the course rode well.”
The national teams consist of four competitors with the fourth competitor named as captain. Teams attend as many qualifiers as they wish until they qualify. Qualifying classes take place throughout May, June and July. Team members may change throughout qualifying however the team that qualifies must remain the same for the final. All four horses must jump at a different heights, 90cm, 1.00m, 1.10m and 1.15m. The horses jumping at 90cm and a metre must be at the start of qualifying registered at Grade C and those jumping 1.10m and 1.15m can be registered at any grade.
Image Credit: 1st Class Images
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