oing first in the 15-horse tiebreaker in the $20,000 Ox Ridge Jumper Classic didn’t faze Henrik Gundersen. He marched in, set a blistering time in the jump-off that no one could catch, and took the top check at the Ox Ridge Horse Show, June 15-18, in Darien, Conn.

The Danish national, who is based in Wellington, Fla., stopped the clock to win in 35.65 seconds aboard The Ridge’s Complete, and then returned riding his own Darvin Garbo for another try at the blue ribbon. But his chestnut gelding brought a rail down at the last fence for seventh place.

Nevertheless, it all added up to a $6,800 paycheck for Gundersen, who was making his first appearance at the historic Ox Ridge Hunt Club grounds along Connecticut’s Gold Coast.

While in Florida, Gunder-sen met Nona Garson and George D’Ambrosio of The Ridge. “We talked about this horse [Complete]. He has a lot of quality and suits my riding well. So we decided to give it a try because he would fit well into my program,” said Gundersen, who was named the show’s best professional rider.

Gundersen has been in this country for 18 months. He spent the first year building his business, Horsegym, an equine treadmill exerciser. As he worked to develop the business, he sold all but two of his horses. “Since the sales of the equipment are doing so well now, I have taken in a few extra horses,” he said, including young prospects from Horses Unlimited of New Mexico as well as Garson’s Complete, a bay, Danish Warmblood gelding.

Gundersen qualified both of his mounts from the initial 34-entry starting field. The odds were in his favor to do well with Darvin Garbo, 10, a gelding that his late father, Arly Gundersen, picked out for him.

“He is maybe the best grand prix horse I ever had,” Gundersen said. “I showed him in five grand prix classes at Saugerties [HITS On The Hudson, N.Y.]. He won one [the $25,000 HITS Grand Prix on June 1], was third, fourth, and eighth in the others. He’s a very powerful yet careful horse. He seems to have it all, so I took some time to bring him along carefully.”

Gundersen has represented Denmark on Nations Cup teams and has competed in the Scandinavian, European and World championships. He grew up at the family riding school, where his father trained Denmark’s national team of juniors and young riders in dressage and show jumping. His mother, Karin Gundersen, an FEI-recognized judge, has managed the Danish team at Olympics and World Championships.

Henrik went through the rigorous European professional education program for six years where he studied dressage (through Prix St. Georges), show jumping and eventing. His wife, Mikala Gundersen, specializes in dressage and competes at the Grand Prix level. He and his wife have two children, Claudia, 8, and Casper, 6.

Brigadoon Is Best
Trainer Lainie Wimberly had much to celebrate at Ox Ridge when her students decorated the tack room at Brigadoon Show Stables with multiple tricolor ribbons and two best rider awards.

“It’s definitely a highlight to have my students do so well,” said Wimberly, who was thrilled with Casey Green’s success in the junior hunter division. “This is really exciting for Casey and me because she just started riding in the juniors.”

Green, 12, Westport, Conn., looked like a seasoned pro as she guided Savannah, a 6-year-old Oldenburg, to the small junior and grand junior hunter titles, and, as icing on the cake, she earned the best child rider on a horse award.

“Savannah’s a second year green hunter and had never done the juniors before Casey started showing her,” said Wim-berly. “It’s basically the start of Casey’s junior hunter career, and I was hugely proud of her.”

Wimberly knew Savannah through trainer Lauren Bass, who showed the seal brown mare in the pre-green and first year green divisions. “I’d helped Lauren periodically for two years,” said Wimberly. “I’d helped her with the mare in Florida and knew she was for sale. When Casey was ready for a horse, I thought it was a great match.”

Green’s second horse show on Savannah was the National Horse Show (Fla.) in November when they earned the children’s hunter championship with blue ribbons in three out of four classes.

“I’d have to say, this is the best match I’ve ever seen between horse and rider,” added Wimberly, who has trained Green for four years.

“I was so happy because this was my first grand cham-pionship on a horse,” said Green, who had been picked as the best child rider on a pony when she showed her Buzz Lightyear. “This was the third time I rode in the juniors. I catch-rode a horse in Florida in that division last winter and have shown Savannah at two shows before this.”

Amateur rider Pamela Vance also contributed to Brigadoon’s blue-ribbon count with the adult amateur, 36 and over, and grand adult amateur championships, victory in the Marshall & Sterling Adult Amateur Classic and the best adult amateur rider award. All of her spoils came aboard Seven Bridges, a flashy chestnut she’s owned for four years.

“He is the quintessential adult amateur hunter,” said Vance. “He’s straightforward and goes without a martingale.”

An easygoing horse, “Dusty’s” only bad habit is that he tends to eat too much. “When he gets heavy, we don’t show him during those periods,” said Vance with a laugh.

Vance, Amenia, N.Y., has earned many accolades aboard the 11-year-old Trakehner, including victories on the Winter Equestrian Festival circuit (Fla.) and World Champion Hunter Rider Regional awards. “We pick and choose shows because we have had such success with him,” Vance added.

Wimberly was pleased with the pair’s consistency at Ox Ridge. “This was a great win, a comeback,” she said. “[Pamela] showed him just twice in Florida. We took our time bringing him back this year. He looks great, is muscular and fit, and looks beautiful.”

Vance began her equestrian career at age 6, and since then riding and horses “are a passion and a way of life for me.” She keeps her top three past performers in retirement, including Bourbon Street, Revelry and Coattails.

Winning Moments
Like Gundersen, Ali Apruzzese, 16, of Harding Township N.J., also made her first appearance at Ox Ridge a winning one when she and Camenetti had the fastest four-fault jump-off round in the Low Junior/Amateur-Owner Jumper Classic.

Although Apruzzese qualified for the six-horse jump-off, she wasn’t thinking of winning then. “I thought [sixth] is fine with me,” she recalled. “I try not to keep my hopes too high because I don’t want to get too dis-appointed, especially in my horse, if I don’t do as well as I expected.”

Apruzzese found the shortened course was difficult because of the undulating grass terrain. “You had to keep the horse in one rhythm, but when you’re going up and down, it’s tough to keep him balanced,” she explained. “So I focused on keeping him between my hand and my leg.”

She had the advantage of going next-to-last in the jump-off, where the leading score had been earned by runner-up Christy Distefano, who had one rail in 47.71 seconds. Apruzzese made short work of bettering that with her 46.62-second round. Only a miscalculation at the last fence, where she lowered a rail, marred her round.

She said winning “was such a good feeling,” after her victory gallop on her 9-year-old- bay warmblood. They also tied for championship honors in the low junior/amateur-owner jumper division with Carola 45 and Kim Swenson.

Apruzzese, a junior at Pingry High School, had been a hunter and equitation rider with Meghan Mallet until three years ago when she decided to switch to jumpers and ride with Meghan’s brother, Jamie Mallet. He had owned Camenetti, nicknamed “Kenny,” for five years before he sold the 16.3-hand gelding to Apruzzese at the end of last summer.

“Kenny and I started in the low jumpers for the first time in Florida last February,” said Apruzzese. “He is very different than my old horse, which is good because I need to learn how to ride all different types of horses. Kenny is so powerful, and I loved that. He trusted me and that won me over.”

Laura Sexton and her trainer, Elizabeth Conifer of Whipstick Farm, had their eyes on Renaissance for more than a year before Sexton bought the 16.2-hand, Dutch Warmblood gelding.

Sexton, Greenwich, Conn., sat on the horse once, before he won her over, and she decided to buy him at the conclusion of the 2001 fall indoor circuit. Within a two-year span, “Remmy” was the top amateur-owner hunter at every show he attended and was grand champion at Old Salem (N.Y.). Their streak continued at Ox Ridge, where Remmy, 13, and Sexton, 21, earned the amateur-owner, 18-35, championship and the grand amateur-owner title.

“He won this very same grand championship at Ox Ridge in 2004,” said Sexton, who swept the division this year with the reserve championship aboard First Hand.

Shortly after purchasing Remmy, Sexton went to college. “We picked and chose [shows] so none of the horses had to show two weeks in a row,” said Sexton, a history and economics major who graduated magna cum laude from Bucknell University (Pa.) in May. “Of all my horses, Remmy is pretty much a steady Eddy.”