Aachen, Germany—July 21
When you think of the great horses of McLain Ward’s career so far, many of them are mares. And on July 20 at the CHIO Aachen a new mare jumped into the record books with Ward, the 10-year-old Oldenburg Noche De Ronda. They were best out of 32 combinations to tackle the Allianz-Prize, a 1.55-meter speed competition.
Steve Guerdat achieved the fastest round with Venard de Cerisy, reaching the finish line in 53.51 seconds. However, two rails down stood in the way of the victory. McLain Ward snapped it up with the horse that he only introduced to the international circuit at the start of the year.
The clock stopped at 55.29 seconds, which left Martin Fuchs with Silver Shine behind him in second place (0/56.20). Third place went to the British rider, Ben Maher (0/58.98) with F One USA, the horse he took a bad fall with on Wednesday, luckily both remained unscathed and were fit to compete today.
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Before Ward, Noche de Ronda had only competed in one young horse competition with Dennis Schlüsselburg. This year she’s won four classes and finished in the top 10 in four other competitions at just five shows.
Watch their winning round, courtesy of USEF Network/CHIO Aachen:
