Clayton Fredericks dissolved into tears as the reality of his biggest win sunk in. “I can’t believe it. I’ve slogged my guts out and I deserve this,” he said emotionally after emerging the hugely popular winner of the FEI Eventing World Cup Final, at Malm0, Sweden, Aug. 11-14.

Lying third after cross-country on the handsome bay gelding Ben Along Time, the 37-year-old Australian rider lined up for the win by jumping clear around the up-to-height show jumping track, despite a nerve-racking hesitation in front of an upright fence.

Meanwhile, the overnight leader, Fredericks’ compatriot Andrew Hoy riding Mr. Pracatan, and runner-up Pia Pantsu of Finland aboard Yp䪤 Karuso, both faulted at the first part of the double at 8A to slip to second and third places, divided by just 0.1 penalties.

Fredericks, who has often played second fiddle to his successful English wife Lucinda, now hopes the classy Ben Along Time, by the Irish jumping sire Cavalier, will secure him a place on the Australian team at next year’s World Equestrian Games, a dream he has spent 12 years pursuing.

He bought Ben Along Time as a 4-year-old in 1999 from the Irish dealer Donal Barnwell and sold him to loyal owners Edwin and Peta McAuley, who are based in Hong Kong and, naturally, harbour ambitions of seeing their horse in action at the 2008 Olympic Games there. The combination has placed every time out, including sixth in last year’s World Cup Final and 13th at their first four-star, Luhmulen (Germany) in June.

“This is the first time I’ve really opened him up and asked him to go fast. I thought it would feel a bit messy, but in fact it felt a lot more flowing than I expected,” Fredericks said after the cross-country, in which he incurred 1.2 time penalties.

“Benalong” comes from the Fredericks’ tradition of naming horses after Australian places, while “been a long time” is a rock music reference (Fredericks is a notable singer) to his long wait for recognition.

“I’ve had a few knocks along the way, and I’ve had to sell some good horses in order to survive. I always thought this horse would be good, though. He’s good looking, moves well, jumps and gallops and is kind. I get a lot of stick at home about how emotional I get over him; he’s definitely my favorite.”

The Australians presented easily the strongest squad at this third World Cup Final, with Olivia Bunn, who runs the family winery, flying over from Australia to finish fifth on her Olympic horse GV Top Of The Line. Australian Phillip Dutton also came over from Pennsylvania to be ninth on Nova Top, a place ahead of his former employee Heidi White on Northern Spy.

For Hoy, who had led from the start, second place was no hardship. “Mr. Pracatan was bred to be a hunter, and so everything he does–and he’s been placed several times at Badminton and Burghley [CCI****s (England)]–is a bonus. He’s a wonderful horse because he tries so hard and is so genuine.”

And for Pantsu, who was denied a trip to the Olympics when Karuso backed into a spike in a freak loading accident, it was a confidence-boosting last run before the European Championships next month, at which she will be a favorite to win gold. “My horse felt fantastic,” she said, beaming.

Jan Thompson finished best of the Americans, in seventh on Task Force. She was one of only two riders–along with Britain’s William Fox-Pitt, fourth on Ballincoola–to remain on her dressage score.

This, combined with the pair’s sixth-placed finish at Rolex Kentucky in April, must seem like a miracle for the Australian-bred Task Force, who was bought from Karen and David O’Connor. He had suffered a broken hind pastern and punctured lung in a fall at the penultimate fence at Burghley last year.

“Our show jumping wasn’t the best performance I’ve ever produced, but it did the job and I was really pleased with our cross-country,” said Thompson. “The plan now is to return home for a winter’s dressage training.”

Still Evolving

Post-event discussions centered on whether the World Cup concept has been completely refined yet. An impressive 14 nations were represented in Malm?ut only by 37 cross-country starters. Few riders had the luxury of their best horses for what is supposed to be a showcase for the sport–the culmination of 18 qualifiers in 12 countries–and the likes of stars Kim Severson, Pippa Funnell, Leslie Law and Bettina Hoy were notably absent.

Event organizer Lars Christensson was asked whether he would consider running Malm?few weeks earlier in 2006 in order to provide a final trial for riders en route to the World Equestrian Games in Aachen, Germany.

“We always run in week 32 here at Malm?nd I don’t know if we can change that, but obviously we will have to consider the possibility,” he said. The Swedish course designer Per Magnusson’s greatest challenge was to provide a meaningful three-star championship for the world’s most experienced riders as well as those from emerging nations such as Brazil, Belarus and Poland.

“When you get the best riders you can dare to ask the questions, and I put in a lot for a three-star,” commented Magnusson. “Fortun-ately the footing was very good; six weeks ago it was hard, but then it rained.”

His second problem was the limited availability of the site, which is a public dog walking park near the city center and against a backdrop of the Baltic Sea.

The urban landscape includes Malm’s famous architectural oddity, the Twisting Torso skyscraper. Course building only began three weeks before the competition, and much of the work was done the week of the event. Finishing touches were not completed until after the competition had actually begun, and it wasn’t easy for riders to form early impressions.

Hoy compared the site to his native Adelaide: “The great thing about having eventing in the city center is that you are taking the sport to the public,” he said. And, indeed, the event attracted a crowd of 18,000 over the four days.

The compact site and twisting nature of the track appeared to indicate that the optimum time of 7:14 would be nearly impossible to achieve. And riders considered the course a tad inconsistent in difficulty, though U.S. Chef d’Equipe Mark Phillips described a couple of the combinations as “six-star.”

Fox-Pitt said the course was a test of harmony between horse and rider, a dictat he demonstrated admirably: “You would want to be on the same wavelength as your horse for this track.”

British team trainer Yogi Breisner, who was enjoying a weekend back in his home country, commented that the course was “tricky rather than very big. Riders will have to concentrate, but this is a factor of modern day courses and they are used to narrow fences now. But I don’t think the course is at all easy.”

A Good Ride

Expectations were confounded, therefore, when the first horse out on course, the lovely little Polish Thoroughbred Wag, ridden by Artur Spolowicz, bounded around clear and two seconds inside time. Spolowicz, who had to go first as the rider with the least World Cup points to his name, demonstrated that if you walked your lines and kicked on without a pull the tricky looking combinations were eminently rideable.

There were 20 clear rounds, including one for Jessica Heidemann with French Twist and Canadian Hawley Bennett on Livingstone, eventual 15th. Nine horses finished inside the time and another six incurred fewer than 2 penalties.

White was fastest of all–7 seconds inside the time–with a superb performance on the English Thoroughbred Northern Spy.

The combination was clearly benefiting from their recent exposure to European competition, including 10th at Badminton, though they later dropped four places to 10th with a disappointing three show jumping rails down.

“Our cross-country did feel pretty fast!” confessed White, who is hoping for a place on the U.S. squad at Aachen next year. “The course felt completely different to other galloping tracks, like at Badminton and Burghley. You had to ride from post to post and find your lines.”

Faults were well spread and there was only one serious fall, to Germany’s Niccole Grimm who suffered concussion and whiplash injuries in a crash over a large oxer. Her compatriot Simone Deitermann, a reserve for the German team at Blenheim, was held on course while medics attended to Grimm.

Two Swedish riders produced promising performances–Viktoria Carlerback, 12th on Bally’s Geronimo, and Dag Albert, 14th on Who’s Blitz. But Magnus Gallerdal and Keymaster, their best combination at the Athens Olympics, took a spectacular dunking at the water. The horse flipped over the second rounded, bounce element into the water, but fortunately Gallerdal was thrown clear, his immersion faithfully reproduced on the front pages of Swedish newspapers next day.

And Sweden’s defending World Cup champion, Linda Algotsson, suffered an unusually off day. She was already near the bottom of the pile after her ride, Fair Dobbin, was intractable in the dressage. It was clear he was not concentrating across country either, as he ran out at the second of the three graffiti fences (fences 18, 19, 20).

U.S. rider Robyn Fisher ran out at the third element with Le Samurai, while another notable casualty was Carl Bouckaert, who had a run-out here on the 18-year-old Welton Molecule, who slipped due to having lost a shoe.

Bouckaert’s partner Karin Donckers fared better, finishing eventual sixth on one of her proposed Belgian team horses, Palmyra.

These were the talking point: three narrow, angled fences painted in gaudy graffiti. Riders requested that the second one be re-sited and dug deeper into the ground to reduce its profile, but they rode well.

“I didn’t know how Mr. Pracatan would read it,” said Hoy. “I’m just glad he didn’t stop to read it!”

Good going meant that all 29 finishers were able to show jump, and, though the course was tough, the only really significant alterations to the order came in the top three. Riders, however, had to accept that their competition was only a secondary attraction in comparison to the serious business of the day–Malm’s traditional rabbit jumping championship!