And a dramatic shuffle occurs in the two-star division.
Corinne Ashton left a trail of blood behind her on the CCI*** cross-country course today, June 13, but as it was coming from her lip and not her horse Dobbin, she didn’t even consider letting it slow her down. And that determination for speed landed her on top of the leaderboard this afternoon, as she added just 1.6 time faults to her dressage score for a current mark of 51.6.
“I made one mistake,” said Ashton, Princeton, Mass. “I asked him to move up to a little oxer, and he knew better and took a short one, and it ended up a messy jump. I caught my lip on his neck. But then I picked myself up, and from then on I did as he suggested. I think there was blood flying off behind me, but that’s OK.”
“We did jump the high side of the brush at the coffin, just for fun,” she added. “But apart from that it was completely uneventful, which is good.”
Ashton had planned to run Dobbin, her 14-year-old Thoroughbred gelding, at the Rolex Kentucky CCI**** in April, and they did start the event, but a pulled back muscle forced her to withdraw. She couldn’t find any fix to get her around the cross-country.
“Nothing would work to get rid of the pain, and it wasn’t fair to [Dobbin],” she said. “He would have tried and done it for me, but I wasn’t prepared to hurt him.”
Dobbin contested his first CCI* at Bromont nine years ago and hadn’t been back since, so Ashton felt it was the perfect time to return to Quebec.
Unfortunately, Ashton’s move up from third after the dressage was partially due to the misfortune of overnight leaders Tiana Coudray and Ringwood Magister, who withdrew this morning, erring on the side of caution on a slight veterinary issue. Second-placed Mara Dean and High Patriot incurred 6.4 time faults to drop to fourth (61.3).
But one of only two double-clear rounds in the division sent Hawley Bennett and Gin N Juice into the runner-up spot. They’re just .3 faults behind Ashton in the standings (51.9), so the pressure will be on tomorrow in the show jumping.
“My ride was amazing,” Bennett, Temecula, Calif., said. “‘Ginny’ was great right from the get-go. She’s fast, but [in the past] I’d had to check her a little bit. But now I think the bigger fences back her off, so I don’t have to do as much work.
“I was actually a little nervous,” Bennett continued. “But I had a good warm-up, and that gave me a good feeling going in, and it ended up being probably one of my best rides ever. She was like a little sports car. I’m so proud of her.”
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Linda Paine owns the 9-year-old Thoroughbred mare, and Bennett has brought her up through the levels. Their road to a CCI*** has been a long one with several detours, stretching from Southern California to New Jersey to Quebec.
“That horse has taught me patience,” Bennett said. “I’ve been to the hospital three times.”
The most recent of those hospitalizations came at the Jersey Fresh CCI*** (N.J.) last month, when Ginny jumped Bennett out of the tack early on the cross-country, and the rider had to ride off the course in an ambulance. Her injuries weren’t serious enough to keep her from re-routing to Bromont, however, and today it seemed her weeks of flying back and forth between the east and west coasts in preparation had paid off.
“She’s been a work in progress, but today she was unbelievable,” Bennett said. “I’m so happy.”
Elsewhere in the CCI*** division, jumping faults were scarce. Boyd Martin had one stop with Rock On Rose, but the majority of horses jumped clean. Buck Davidson and Waylon Roberts were eliminated for falls from May I Tell Ya and Myrrdin’s Sebastian, respectively.
Aside from Bennett, Davidson was the only other rider to go double-clear, with his second horse, Triomphe.
Speed Puts Slezak On Top
Standings in the CCI** division shuffled dramatically today as the dressage leaders plummeted in the placings, and no one made time. But with just 1.6 time faults aboard Penny Rowland’s Charley Farley, Karl Slezak moved up from sixth place to first.
Rowland competed the gray gelding through the two-star level herself, but offered the horse to Slezak this spring so she could concentrate on her lower-level horses and watch Charley compete at the advanced level. Slezak took over the ride at the end of April, right after he rode Kachemak Bay at the Rolex Kentucky CCI****, but he hadn’t quite established a bond with the new horse before this week.
“It didn’t take me very long [to get to know him], but it definitely hadn’t happened yet at our last show,” Slezak said. “I was a little nervous today. There wasn’t anything I was really concerned about, it was just the whole not knowing him well thing. But I tried to give him a positive round the whole way around, and he just ate it up. He was very confident, and I had a lot of fun on him. He was on it.”
Slezak, who is originally from Tottenham, Ont., had the fastest round in the division.
“He was fit, and he’s got a big stride,” Slezak said. “Coming into this, Penny and I had talked about it, and she was very confident that he was fit enough to go for it. And it’s been a while since I’ve run here, but I just kind of put the pedal down from the very beginning. I let him coast a little near the end, but after the last water I just sort of gave him a kick, and he was still full of running. So we just kept running up until the end.”
Many riders were surprised by how slowly the course rode, however, and were disappointed with their times.
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“I think the important thing here is not to actually stick to your minute markers, but to conserve energy when your horse is laboring up the mountains,” said Martin, who is riding multiple mounts this weekend and is in second place in the one-star division. “Then you run along once the going gets flat and easier for your horse. The art of making the time on this course is to go by the feeling your horse gives you.”
Jumping faults, not time, were mostly to blame for the demise of the CCI** dressage leaders though. Winner Kristin Bond’s horse Are You Ready nearly jumped her out of the tack over the first of two corners at 14AB, and she couldn’t get reorganized in time for the second element. She then had another stop at the last fence on course.
Sharon White, who was in second coming into cross-country, had problems at 14AB as well. Her horse Rafferty’s Rules had a naughty stop at the first corner. Phillip Dutton and Dario jumped clean but incurred time faults, keeping them from moving up, and fourth-placed Kelli McMullen-Temple had two stops with Axel Rose. Leahona Rowland, in fifth place after dressage, was eliminated for a fall from Lorenzo III at Fence 5B.
But with a clear, quick round, Nick Cwick and Simply Priceless moved up from a tie for seventh into second place.
McMullen-Temple Maintains Her Lead
In contrast to the CCI**, the one-star division’s top standings remained constant, as the top four riders all went double-clear. But leaders Kelli McMullen-Temple and Veelion will have nothing in hand going into show jumping tomorrow. Martin and Minotaure du Passoir are 3.7 points behind.
McMullen-Temple and Veelion, a 7-year-old Dutch Warmblood gelding, won both a preliminary and an intermediate horse trial last month, and they’ve looked right on form all weekend, holding on to their dressage mark of 42.4.
While the leaders fared well, many other riders struggled with the undulating course. Four were eliminated, and six more had jumping penalties.
Fence 4AB seemed to cause the most problems on the course. Riders had to cross a culvert, make an immediate left turn to a downhill fence, then bend right around a tree to a skinny chevron set beside the large white VIP tent.
Many horses seemed distracted during their approach to the B element and incurred quick stops or run-outs there; a handful never made it on to Fence 5. Among others, sixth-placed Erin Renfroe retired Glacier Bay after two stops there, and 10th placed Martin had a run-out with Aberjoy.
