Horse trials season nears peak with Wandin, Heytesbury events
LOOKING at the Victorian horse trials calendar it shows that the sport is alive and very well.
The past few weeks alone shows just how busy the season has been and with the big Adelaide five-star event coming up in a couple of weeks and Melbourne’s three-day event winding up the year’s competition there’s a lot more to come.
Sophia Hill has continued her dominance after winning three of the competitions at Tonimbuk Horse Trials in early March. She took three of the four international classes at Wandin again, with her Thoroughbred Humble Glory winning the four-star and Seattle Park and Tulara Baltango each taking out a two-star class.
David Middleton on WEC In The Money followed Hill into second place in the four-star, with Samuel Jeffree and Wimborne Conjuror third.
Teegan Ashby won the three-star with Magic Mushroom TAE with Molly Lines and Tadpole second and Jeffree placing third again on Santoro.
Heytesbury Horse trials followed, showing there was no slacking off in numbers with Sheridan Houston and Patanga Lodge Mercury finishing on top of a strong field of 20 in the three-star class.
Will Enzinger and Epic Xtreme led from the dressage phase to win the two-star and the two one-star sections went to Tara Anderson’s Sandarstar Dami in the open and Jennifer Duffy’s Notre Amour in the off-the-track class.
All of the big events take great care in providing classes for the up-and-coming young horses with young horse classes, and the people that know their own and their horse’s limits and happily compete at 65 and 85cm.
At Heytesbury, the EvA65 Young Horse (Zoe Warrell memorial event) was won by Jessica Jallands’ Sweet Briar Miracle Mist followed by Amber Balazs-Ashman and LH Vanilla in second place. Balazs-Ashman rode Iceman to a win in the open 65cm class.
Yona Lloyd placed first and second in the young horse 80cm class riding Ballahowe Aquamente and Ballahowe Erised. There were two divisions in the open 80cm class, with the first going to Bonnie Stewart and Break The Ice and the second to Lucy Gubbins and Manuka.
The young horse 95cm class was won by Lucy Kolomanski and Fanatical and the open 95cm by Kylie Pedder riding Aris Woodbury.
The Melbourne three-day event on the long weekend in June closes the season and the horses will have a good rest, while the sports fans will turn their attention to the selection of Australian riders for the Paris Olympics.
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