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DAY 3 - CROSS COUNTRY
 
My eventing office is fast becoming a hive of activity. IPads, Macs, iPhones, Foxtel, Michelle Clough, my non-horsey boyfriend (who’s been put in charge of the technical stuff/iPad live feed scoring/coffee!), one snoring dog, & a phone call from Greenwich from Johnny Walker giving the latest news just before the cross country begins!
The word is that the course is on the small side, hilly & twisty, but has an easy downhill finish that will aid recovery & help a quick run home. The course is not tough enough to knock the Germans clean out of our way, so it’s going to come down to time. There’s a couple of tough combinations (20 & 24), but the general consensus is that it’s hard to build an Olympic track that won’t completely demolish the less experienced eventing nations (serious injury at the Olympics wouldn’t do equestrian’s longevity as a sport much good!). The beautiful parkland old turf is perfect underfoot…but there’s a monsoon forecasted for the last few riders…
The TV coverage is all blue skies & old turf lawn, & Boyd Martin scoots off as the fearless leader. He’s fairly hooting along on the super jumping Otis, making it all look pretty easy, & returns home with 3.6 time…
Australia’s trailblazer Chris Burton (Burto) pilots Lani with purpose, but we’re watching from the ‘iCouch’ telling him to hurry up as it looks like he’s on cruise mode! However the mare covers ground with ease, & the pair eat up the course & return home on their dressage score looking like they could’ve gone round again!
The biggest issue so far looks like the steep terrain, & if the riders cant balance & control their horses well enough, they make a hash of it. The corners are a bit slippery & those who come galloping down the steep hills like a herd of turtles end up unstuck. The Olympics is a mixture of talented professionals, so produces some very mixed results.
Then there was a hold on course, as poor Alena Tseliapushkina from BLR awaits the horse ambulance to take her horse Passat off course. From the iCouch view, it looked like the horse either stood on his bell boot or shoe on take-off & couldn’t get one of his front legs out of the way.
Speaking of slippery turns, Sam Griffiths headed out and had a close call before the first water! The iCouch explodes with hollers of advice as we put our hearts back in our mouths to watch the rest of Sam’s round! Into the second water & our hearts again jump up with our dinner, then another slip… then there’s some footage of a riderless horse with a familiar fluffy breastplate galloping along on course…
Then the confirmation that Sam’s been eliminated for a fall – he & Happy Times are both OK.
A few riders later Canada’s Hawley Bennet-Awad is blazing around the track, eating up the course, & then oops… another riderless horse. Gin & Juice takes advantage of her international status, & causes a hold on course for her frivolities! Michelle makes a cracker of an observation… ‘there are 80,000 spectators & one loose horse, & they still can’t catch it’!
Without seeing Sam & Hawley’s falls, it is believed they may have slipped on the flat.
Dirk Schrade beetles around looking totally under control, riding a beautiful round, however incurs 10.8 time faults to pop into 2ndbehind Burto.
Click here for Part 2 of the report.
Click here to view the Photos from the day
Amanda Ross for Equestrian Life
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