Martin Makes The Most Of A Muddy Fair Hill

He and the scrappy Neville Bardos score their first CCI*** victory, and they do it for the red, white and blue.

Boyd Martin was feeling a little bit left out. Having won a one-, two- and four-star CCI before the age of 30, he had little to lament in terms of his career, but the elusive three-star victory was beginning to bother the Australian-turned-American prodigy.

“I’ve come second a number of times in three-stars in Australia and America,” said Martin, who changed his citizenship with the Fédération Equestre Internationale to compete for the United States this June. “Even though it doesn’t really mean anything, it was something that had been eating away at me a little bit.”

So when Martin, West Grove, Pa., thrust his fist in the air after clearing the final jump at the Dansko Fair Hill CCI*** in Elkton, Md., Oct. 14-18, it wasn’t just in celebration of winning a singular battle. He’d won the war.

“I’ve run second in three-stars in Melbourne [Australia] and at Fair Hill and a couple others, and I felt I got really close to winning and then just couldn’t quite do it,” Martin said. “So I had a little bit of pressure on myself. I think it’s a mark in my life that I’ve accomplished every level on every style of horse.”

Constant rains and temperatures in the low 40s tested the mettle of every horse and rider at this year’s U.S. Equestrian Federation National CCI***/CCI** Championship at Fair Hill, and Martin was proud to lead the victory gallop aboard his scrappy 10-year-old Australian Thoroughbred, Neville Bardos.

“When it comes down to a gladiatorial cage fight, you’re left with tough, hungry horses,” Martin said. “I think if you look down the list of the top bunch of riders here, they’re proven people that are experienced riding in conditions that aren’t perfect, on horses that’ve got a bit of grunt and can man up when things aren’t perfect.”

Though the horse has missed some competitions recently due to ill-timed minor injuries, Martin still thinks “Neville” (Mahayaa—Zambia) fits that description. In fact, he’s named after a character from the film Chopper, about a notorious Australian criminal and ex-convict.

The gelding finished fourth at his first CCI***, at Fair Hill in 2007, and ninth at the 2008 Rolex Kentucky CCI****—not bad for a horse Martin picked up as 3-year-old off the track in Australia for about $1,000. He initially tried to sell the chestnut gelding, but couldn’t find a buyer.

While they don’t typically win the dressage—they placed 16th at Fair Hill with a 51.0—Martin and Neville excel on the cross-country. With several inches of rain saturating the grounds, officials removed 10 fences from the course of 40 jumping efforts and reduced the optimal speed from 570 mpm to 510 mpm. Twenty-one riders withdrew, but Martin saw an open door and was ready to ride through it.

“He’s a real Thoroughbred, so he’s quite suited to these sort of conditions,” he said of Neville. “He really galloped on top of the mud and did it quite easily, to be honest. I didn’t feel like I was pushing him much at all.”

Martin shot to the top of the leaderboard with the division’s only double-clear cross-country round, past Karen O’Connor and Joan Goswell’s Mandiba, who were the only pair all weekend to break into the 30s in the dressage. They won the first phase on a 39.6 and dropped to second after cross-country with 15.6 time faults.