Kristen Bond scored her first advanced win aboard new mount Blackout at the Plantation Horse Trials, Sept. 17-18 in Unionville, Pa. She purchased the 10-year-old New Zealand-bred from Stuart Black in July.

“Buck [Davidson] found him for me. He has a gift for finding horses who match [the rider] perfectly, and he made a really good call on that one,” Bond said. “It’s what you always hope will happen, to find a horse you get on with so well.”

Bond posted one of only three fault-free show jumping rounds in advanced, division 2, over ground that had been inundated with rain. “It’s hard for me to take credit for it. I feel like I didn’t have a lot to do with it,” she said modestly. “It just kind of happened. He jumped the crap out of everything and made a joke of it.”

As the event was the pair’s final cross-country run before Bond’s first three-star CCI at Fair Hill (Md.), on Oct. 13-16, she said she’d expected a big, technical course. “It never let up at all; it was one hard question after another. The second-to-last fence was a serious question,” she said.

Although Bond, 25, posted a clean round, to finish on her dressage score, she said she hadn’t even been trying to make the time.

“I was just trying to survive,” she said with a laugh. “In the warm-up, I watched three people, and they all fell off at the water. They were calling at the start box for anyone to go, and I thought, ‘OK, here goes nothing. I’ll give it a go.’ “

With a horse as experienced as Blackout, Bond said she can finally do what Davidson has always been trying to teach her–as little as possible. “With Blackout, I’m able to do that, to just stay out of his way,” she said.

And she’d had no expectations of winning her first advanced event. Bond, originally from Gig Harbor, Wash., has been living with Laura and Keith Jones near Medford, N.J., in order to train with Davidson. Laura also trains with Davidson, and Keith used to play hockey for the Philadelphia Flyers.

“I was reading an article about Keith in a magazine in their house, and they asked him once if he had anything choreographed when he scored a goal,” recalled Bond. “He said, ‘No way, I never thought I’d score a goal.’ That was sort of how I felt [about winning]. I’m still kind of in shock. I guess it means we’re on the right track. I hope I won’t blink and it will go away.”

Davidson also grabbed a win of his own, aboard Jan Smith and Carl and Cassie Segal’s Idalgo, after putting in the horse’s best dressage yet. “He’s fantastic on the flat,” said Davidson of the 9-year-old Selle Francais.

The pair finished eighth at the 2004 Foxhall CCI*** (Ga.), but small setbacks have kept the horse from what Davidson had always thought he could achieve.

“We’ve always treated him like a fancy young horse, like a piece of china, but he never gave the results I thought he was capable of. He’s a hard-luck horse, and it’s been one little thing after another. So we just started treating him like a normal horse,” said Davidson.

Since he’d had trouble with skinny fences in the past, Davidson decided to spend more time jumping the horse. “When he loses confidence, he gets strong in the bridle, and then he runs out,” said Davidson. “So I’ve been doing my homework. I’ve cut back on competing him and am working on my training.

Every time he goes out now, he should be right there close to winning. He’s as fancy a horse as I’ve ever had.”

Davidson was especially pleased with how Idalgo handled all the skinnies–coming out of the water, coming out of the foundation, on the first and third elements of the coffin–at Plantation.

“Two months ago, he would have gone out the gap and not jumped [at the coffin],” said Davidson. “I’m ecstatic about him. He’s headed to Fair Hill, and I sort of like my chances with him.”

Bonnie Mosser also likes her chances for Fair Hill aboard her new mount, Rebecca Polan’s Close The Deal. She finished third at Plantation in her first advanced start aboard the 11-year-old Dutch Warmblood-Thoroughbred cross.

“The cross-country round was effortless. I haven’t had that feeling, ever,” said Mosser, of Coatesville, Pa.

Mosser said she didn’t let the problems on course affect her. Twelve of 34 advanced cross-country horses jumped clear, four of them also finishing within the time allowed, but 11 horses didn’t finish the course. Denis Glaccum, the course designer and organizer, said at least 14 of the course’s fences caused penalties.

“Walking the course, I felt like there was a lot to do at intermediate and advanced. It was a little tougher, and I was a little nervous, but I didn’t feel like anything was out of the question,” Mosser said.

She said the coffin, with steep drops before and after the ditch, is rarely seen in this country, other than at Rolex Kentucky. And she had another theory for the problems.

“Who’s usually the first rider out? Phillip Dutton. And who do we all stand and watch? Phillip.”

Since he was attending a wedding instead of competing, riders couldn’t study how the country’s leading rider handled the new combinations. “The warm-up was sports psychology 101,” said Mosser. “You’re either confident enough to get over seeing things go wrong, or you go home. There were a lot of people green at that level, and they want to see something done confidently. But when you’re going advanced, it’s up to you. You can’t rely on anyone else.”