British riders have taken six of the top nine places on the leaderboard at the European Eventing Championships and lead the team standings, but the irrepressible Michael Jung of Germany stands first individually after dressage with fischerChipmunk on a score of 19.4 penalties.
“My feeling was very good,” said Michi about his test.
“I’m very happy about fischerChipmunk. He was amazing to ride. He was super in the preparation time (last week).”
Today, “he was very calm; in the beginning he was a little bit tense. That’s the reason why I went in so early (to the arena) to have a little more time,” noted Michi, who thought his canter was a highlight of the test.
Michael Jung and fischerChipmunk. (Les Garennes photo)
The British squad has 67.1 penalties from the best three riders, a 9.2 penalty edge over Germany on 76.3. Belgium is third on 90.9.
British team rider Ros Canter and Lordships Graffalo is not far behind Michi with 21.3, while Tom McEwan–riding JL Dublin as an individual, is third on 22. The other Brits were marked this way: 4, Laura Collett and London 52 (22.4), 5, world champion Yasmin Ingham (Banzai du Loir, 23.4), 6. Tom Jackson, riding as an individual with Capels Hollow Drift (25.7) and Kitty King (Vendredi Biats, 27.2).
Ros recalled that she had to give herself a reminder “not to have too high an expectation and to stick to the process and remind myself that he’s still a horse that physically isn’t fully matured yet, and I was to stick within the boundaries of what he was capable of, but he actually gets stronger all the time.
“It’s little things – his changes are getting better and better, his halt and his rein-back were a real weakness last year and the start of this year, and this summer they’re starting to feel like they’re getting very consistent, so it’s really exciting,” said the 2018 world champion.
Great Britain’s Ros Canter and Lordships Graffalo. (Les Garennes photo)
“There are little things I would tweak for next time, but on the whole, I think our training is just gradually going in the right direction, which is what I’m really pleased with,” she explained.
With the wet weather for the majority of the day, Ros’ thoughts turned to the Saturday cross-country. Those of us who were at the 2014 world championships in Normandy remember how bad the going got for cross-country after it had been wet, so it is interesting to know what Ros thinks.
“The first water is a very big drop in, so it’ll be interesting to see how they read that. Of course, with Walter (as she calls her horse), we are still coming across questions that he hasn’t actually come across before, with his age, even though he’s done what he’s done already. He tends to drift a bit more to the right and little things like that, so for my personal self I have to walk the course very much thinking of Walter, but I think it’s more the undulations, the twists and turns that are going to create more challenges at the jumps.
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“It walks very much like a short format, but obviously, you’ve got the length added onto it as well, so it will be mentally and physically quite challenging for the horses, and I think that’s where the questions are going to lie. The first three fences are basically on a 360 (degrees) to a 180, so it’s going to be very hard at the start of the course to get into the speed that you really want to be in. I think it’s highly likely by minute one you’re going to be down on the clock, and then I think it just depends on if you can claw it back and stay inside the time.
“We’ve been very positive as a team so far about the course – our course walks have been extremely positive and there hasn’t been too much talk on the parts we don’t like or the ground we don’t like, and I think that’s really good for team spirit,” she concluded.
Click here for team results. Click this link for individual standings.
