After a slow start this year, Anky van Grunsven’s star rises again.

He’s back.

IPS Salinero showed the world he’s returned to form during the Exquis World Dressage Masters CDI*****, held June 11-13 in Cannes, France, in conjunction with show jumping’s Global Champions Tour (p. 74). In his first international outdoor appearance since earning gold at the 2008 Olympic Games in Hong Kong, Salinero topped an impressive field in the Grand Prix and the Grand Prix freestyle during the fourth leg of the WDM series.

Anky van Grunsven’s competition schedule for the 15-year-old dressage superstar hadn’t gone according to plan this year. She’d intended to compete Salinero in the Gothenburg CDI-W (Sweden) in February and then head to Las Vegas, Nev., to defend her Rolex FEI World Cup title, but her last-minute back injury stopped the horse en route and ended their American dream. Without that run in Sweden, Salinero wasn’t qualified for the World Cup Final.

Consequently, van Grunsven had to rethink his season. Thus far Salinero had only been seen at a Dutch national show, where he appeared a little ring rusty and was beaten by Edward Gal and new superstar Moorlands Tortillas.

Unfortunately, Gal and Moorlands Tortillas were unable to make Cannes for a rematch. But with 13 other top combinations all vying for the $28,000 first prize for the freestyle, it was a hot contest.

Fourteen starters entered the Grand Prix, then the top eight could choose to ride in either the evening freestyle under the lights or in the afternoon Grand Prix Special, which offered less prize money.

Van Grunsven chose the freestyle, of course, and Salinero shrugged off much of the rust and held his own, scoring 79.85 percent in a tough battle with Kyra Kyrklund and Max. The British-based Finnish rider matched van Grunsven’s scores until a loss of rhythm in the right pirouette ended her chances, leaving her second again with 76.05 percent (she’d also finished second in the WDM Munich leg in May).

Van Grunsven, meanwhile, decided to point Salinero toward the Rotterdam CDIO the following week.

“The show jumpers do this, going from one show to the next to prepare their horses as a matter of course. So I will take Salinero to Holland, which will be his third week of competition in a row, because perhaps we have been out of the ring for too long,” she said. “He was quite tense tonight when we started, and I need to work steadily toward the European Championships [in August].

“This was not my best ride ever, but it is very good for the sport to be on the same stage as the Global Champions Tour,” she added with a smile. “And this is a lovely venue, with the hot weather and swimming for our children!”

The WDM, a series of invitation-only classes held over four shows and offering the world’s best dressage riders substantial prize money, is held in Wellington, Fla., in January, Munich, Germany, in May, Cannes in June and Hickstead, England, in July.

With the likes of Isabell Werth winning the Grand Prix Special in Munich on her great champion Satchmo, van Grunsven taking the Wellington leg on Painted Black and Ulla Salzgeber and Kyrklund filling runners-up places, the series has so far been everything the organizers could have hoped for.

In Cannes, the dressage was held on the back of the Global Champions Tour show jumping event, which ensured huge crowds, although rather late night finishes.

Catherine Haddad, originally from Michigan although a German resident, represented the United States on her 12-year-old gelding Cadillac 35. In the Grand Prix class, Haddad and Cadillac finished tied for seventh behind van Grunsven and Salinero after, declared the rider, “on a scale of one to 10, I rode that like a two.”

Cadillac, who competed in the Gothenburg CDI-W and finished seventh in the World Cup qualifier there, was a little inexperienced at big occasions. “I decided to go for the Special and not the freestyle [at Cannes] because he has not done a class under floodlights before, and you never know in advance how that might affect them,” she said.

In the class, she need not have worried. Cadillac behaved like an old hand despite the huge crowd leftover from earlier show jumping, and the pair finished fourth (behind German Anja Plonzeke aboard Le Mont d’Or) with a respectable score of 65.25 percent, 2.75 points shy of the winner.

“I was much more pleased with that ride,” she said. “As for this place, I have been to some very impressive shows, and in Europe it’s common to get top-class dressage and show jumping on the same bill, but this show is something else. It’s my first visit here, and I hope I get invited again.”