An emotional win at Old Salem

Adrienne Sternlicht loves her horse.

The affection is well-deserved He got a grateful kiss from her after a fault-free first round in the $200,000 Blue Diamond Cup Grand Prix. Then there was another heartfelt smooch after his victorious trip in the jump-off Saturday at Old Salem Farm.

“He’s a horse I really believed in from the second I sat on him as an eight-year-old,” she said of Origa V/H Zuid-Pajottenland. (Whatever happened to names like Big Ben and Gem Twist?)

The 11-year-old Belgian warmblood gelding was out for a year after fracturing  a hip in a freak accident when he slipped at home, so Adrienne had a bit of a hiatus in her big time competition results until he won a 5-star a month ago in Ottawa.

“I’m so emotionally proud of him, how he’s come back. I’ve always said it was one of the best feelings I’ve ever had on a horse and to see him really get his time in the spotlight means a lot to me,” said Adrienne, a member of the U.S. gold medal team at the 2018 FEI World Equestrian Games.

“Whenever you go through those ups and downs with a horse, it’s always an emotional journey and it’s so rewarding to be on the other side of it.”

The winner is by Thunder VD Zuuthoeve, who was the sire of McLain Ward’s FEI World Cup Finals-winning horse, HH Azur. Interestingly, also on Saturday, but in Traverse City, Mich., Karl Cook topped a Winning Round class with Kalinka van’t Zorgvliet, who claims the same sire. And she was doing only her second grand prix in 18 months because she fractured her hip in the spring of 2024. Talk about an odd coincidence!

Origa was previously ridden by Jonna Ekberg of Sweden, but came to Adrienne through her good friend Irish show jumper Bertram Allen.

“I was gnawing at him to let me come try him,” she recounted.

With the horse’s heritage, not surprisingly he has real character and ability, as exhibited in a five-horse jump-off after a field of 32 competitors from 14 countries was narrowed by the well-produced Blue Diamond Cup course from designers Alan Wade and Paul Jewell.

Adrienne’s major competition came from Marilyn Little on the fleet Mecklenberg mare, La Contessa, and Molly Ashe Cawley on Quimi del Maset, a Spanish gelding. But Adrienne enjoyed a benefit by going last, and she took advantage of it.

Molly set the pace in 40.50 seconds and then Marilyn, winner of Thursday’s Welcome Stake, quickly bettered the time to beat in 39.85 seconds.

Adrienne was faster between the first two fences than Marilyn, and made a great turn that brought her home in 39.11 seconds to take the 4-star crown. She attributed the win to her horse’s “stride and his bravery.”

She noted, “I really trusted my horse because he’s so game and has so much scope. I knew that if I did it right and gave him a good chance, he would fight for me.”

During her showing lull between August 2024 and January of this year, Adrienne focused on learning and benefited from polishing her skills with experts. Click on the video link to have her tell you who she worked with and what she did.

The weather in Westchester County, N.Y., was picture-perfect for the class; the rain didn’t start falling until the last notes of the Star-Spangled Banner following the presentation. Old Salem is a lovely setting for a show, and that is especially so in September. It feels special to be there with view of the the stable overlooking the ring and people watching from the grass hillside. The show is a must stop for Adrienne.

“I will always come to old Salem,” she said.

“It’s close to home for me. It was able to work well with my schedule. i can still pay attention to my horses at home and ride at home in the morning and sleep in my own bed in New York City. “That makes Old Salem a special place for me,” noted Adrienne, who has a farm in Greenwich, Conn., near Old Salem.

She fits in riding with a busy schedule that include a new blog, Show and Tell, which she started with her friends, Lucy Deslauriers and Alessandra Volpi, who also travel the show circuit and need to find places that will feed, exercise and soothe them.

“I almost annoyingly look for good coffee. I look for good restaurants, workout places, yoga is a big part of my not just fitness routine, but  mental health. I find it really difficult when you’re in these random cities knowing where to go,” said Adrienne.

So the riders made it a project.

“We said,`Why not do it together? We have a lot of big ideas for our little blog and we’re very excited to see what we can do with it. We want to share all the great places we get to go and learn along the way. And it’s so fun to do it with friends.”

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