Shane heading to Royal International Horse Show, Hickstead - 22-26 July 2009

 

Shane Sweetnam will be representing the Irish Team on the Nation's Cup at the Royal International Horse Show in  Hickstead and will be then going onto the Dublin Horse Show the first week in August.  Shane's incredibly consistent performance during the early shows for the Meydan Cup Series secured him another trip across the ocean.  It should be an exciting few weeks.  For those of us at home we can watch on www.feitv.org.  Read the letter from Her Majesty The Queen, a patron of the horse show: http://www.hickstead.co.uk/pdfs/Letter.pdf

 

The Irish Team is going into the last legs of the series with an amazing victory today in Falsterbo. "Three second-round clears secured victory for Ireland at the sixth leg of the Meydan FEI Nations Cup™ series in Falsterbo, Sweden this afternoon where the winning side's Darragh Kerins and Night Train and French rider Olivier Guillon and Lord de Theize registered the only completely fault-free performances.  It very nearly came down to yet another two-way jump-off against the clock to decide the winner, but the home team from Sweden had to settle for runner-up spot when anchorman Rolf-Goran Bengtsson's inexperienced mare Kiara La Silla faulted in the closing stages."  Ireland now stands 6th in the overall standings.    See the full story:

 

FEI Full Results Falsterbo

 

Good Luck to Shane and Amaretto D'Arco!!

Julia Lourie on her newest mount Triviant continues to excel in the High Junior Jumpers.  For the second week in a row Julia finishes in the top three in the SJHOF $10,000 High Jr/AO Classic.  Julia continues last week's success in the equitation garnering 6th out of a class of 32 in the USEF Medal and 3rd in the the ASPCA Maclay.

 

Other jumpers come back strong Week II as well.  Shane wins the NAL Open Speed Class on Little Emir and takes 3rd in the same class on Unadonja. Unadonja also was 9th in the $10,000 Open Prix. SCF Culper continues to be very consistent in the 5/6 year old jumper division with top ribbons in two classes.  Taboo and Kaitlin returned to the show ring after a break from Spruce Meadows with impressive 2nd place finishes in both Low Jr/AO classes and with the fastest jump-off time, but a single rail, the pair finish 5th in the $5,000 Low Jr/AO Classic.

 

Lismacbryan was reserve champion in the Older Large Junior Hunters, winning two of the over fences classes.

Spy Coast Farm's Sienna Wins $5,000 NAL Low Jr/AO Classic

 

Horse Shows By The Bay continues to be one our favorite summer stops. Each year more improvements, more fun and more competitors make this series the place to be. The Grand Prix ring is big and inviting and the hunter courses are challenging and fun. The weather started off really cold…winter coats were in order…but by midweek the weather was beautiful and so were the results.

 

Julia Lourie was 2nd in the ASPCA Maclay out of more than 26 top competitors. Kaitlin Campbell won the Junior Hunter class on Spy Coast Farm’s Lismacbryan Jr. and Richard Moloney won the Young Jumpers 5/6 Year Olds on SCF Culper. Julia continues her upward success on Triviant moving into the High Jr./AO Jumper division with a very impressive 5th place win in the $10,000 SJHOF Junior/AO Jumper Prix against some very tough competition from Laura Pfeiffer, Catherine Pasmore and Victoria Birdsall.

 

Sienna continues her winning ways, fresh off wins from Spruce Meadows, taking home the top prize in the $5000 NAL Low Junior/AO Jumper in blazing time. Sienna was several seconds faster than the rest of the 30 horse field. Lillian Keenan on Chloe was the only one to make a good run at Sienna’s time but missed the mark by .6 seconds to take second place.

 

Spy Coast Farm sponsored the $30,000 Grand Prix. The 23 horse field saw 11 clear rounds for the jump-off. In the end there were four double clear rounds with Ali Wolff taking away top honors. It was certainly her lucky day as she popped a jump out of its cup in both rounds only to have it land back in the cups each time. Last year’s winner, Addison Phillips garnered 5th and Kaitlin Campbell in her Grand Prix debut on Connery 9 was 7th.

 

Class: 406 - $30,000 Spy Coast Farm Grand Prix of Travis City Place Horse Rider Owners

 

1 H & M Necoll Ali Wolff Black Lick Bend Farm

 

2 Impulsive Scott Lenkart MacMillan Sport Horse

 

3 Urnike Patricia Griffith Heritage Farm, Inc

 

4 Lanoo Ali Wolff Black Lick Bend Farm

 

5 Cernunnus Addison Phillips Addison Phillips

 

6 Online Kate Reuter Newstone Farm, LLC

 

7 Connery 9 Kaitlin Campbell Sweet Oak Farm

 

8 VDL Umilion H Erin Ferguson Captivate Farms LLC

 

9 Euro Mon Amie Maggie McAlary Maggie McAlary

 

10 Teirra Addison Phillips Addison Phillips

 

11 Hot Wheels Victoria Birdsall Miranda Fischer

 

12 Pablo Catherine Inch Katriina Routsalo

Double Rainbow Over Calgary Near Show Grounds in Rare Rainstorm

 

The Mercedez-Benz Classic 1.60 Speed Derby was extremely exciting and Little Emir wowed the crowd as he galloped around. He stood on top of the leader board halfway through the class. Many of the riders in the second group had the advantage of watching this unbelievably difficult track and in the end Emir finished 7th in this $175,000 class behind Leslie Howard, the winner, Jill Henselwood, Ian Miller, Jon Anderson and Beezie Madden. Not a single rider was clear in the class which says a great deal about the toughness of these courses.

 

Amaretto D’Arco had a fabulous Spruce Meadows gaining top places in many classes. At Canada One D’Arco was one of 7 in the jump-off. He was the fastest of those in the jump-off but a single rail placed him 5th in the 1.45 RSA Cup. The most exciting was the Queen Elizabeth Cup in the International Ring, the most prestigious class of the last horse show at Spruce. Only the top 12 jumped off and D’Arco with only 4 faults in this most difficult course came back for the jump-off and in with only a single rail in the jump-off he was able to move up and finish in the 10th spot with a combined total of 5 faults. D’Arco was also in the top 10 in the Enerflex 1.60 Cup at The National Tournament which included ribbon winners Eric Lamaze, Ian Miller, Jill Henselwood, and Will Simpson.

 

Richard Moloney came to help the second week and showed SCF Culper to a 7th place finish in the Glenow Barrage 1.30 class. And Connery 9, owned by Sweet Oak Farm, was consistently in the ribbons in the 1.4 Junior/AO division. All the horses came away with a chance to do a victory gallap. Tangelo Z in the 1.30 division was 3rd in the Welcome class and 12th in the Oxford Properties class, Rolette was 8th in the $25,000 Westlet Cup, Unadonja was in the victory gallop for the 1.40 Trimac Cup and the $20,000 ATCO Gas Cup with over 40 in the class.

 

Spruce Meadows exceeded all of our expectations and we held our own against what was probably the most competitive group of riders we have seen all year. The learning experience for all the horses and riders is exceptional and we can’t wait to come back next year. Special thanks to Kikay, Chelsea, and Asha for taking such great care of the horses and hanging in there for those 15 hour days.

 

Next stop….Horse Shows on the Bay in Michigan.

Challenging Courses Made For Great Fun

Unaltered photo captured at Spruce Meadows. Rainbow is over the horse show.

Our expectations were high since we have heard so much about it. Often that is the kiss of death but it is an amazing venue and the show is run like no other in that we have been to in the U.S. Four impeccably groomed, enormous (I mean really enormous) grass arenas that groundskeepers keep in perfect condition while the classes are going on they are putting down dirt, fixing divots, making sure the footing is as perfect as possible for each rider. The jumps were big and beautiful and unusual and the course designers put everyone to the test.

 

For the two weeks we were there the weather could not have been more cooperative. The competition was incredibly fierce in all divisions. Eric Lamaze, Beezie Madden, Rodrigo Pessoa, Jill Henselwood, Ian Miller, Will Simpson and Mario Deslauriers had multiple mounts in all the classes. The courses were extremely tough, technical and the time allowed in every class was tight. All classes had some combination of water, bank jumps, grobs, and liver pools. The bank in the Speed Derby was so steep that even a top notch skier might have found it daunting.

 

The Derby’s in all divisions were brutal….very long courses with multiple combinations and the jumps were set big so there simply was no room for error.  Julia had yet another clean round with Triviant in the Junior/Amateur Speed Derby Classic and was just out of the ribbons.  Kaitlin was first to go in the 1.30 Fast Track Derby on Taboo with a clean round in a fast 104 seconds.  She finished up in 6^th place after all 48 had gone which was a a great showing for Taboo, who Is only 7 years old and by far the youngest  horse in the class.  Taboo, owned in partnership with Spy Coast Farm, was also 5^th in the Akita Drilling Power and Speed Class held in the Meadows on the Green ring.  She was extremely fast in 36.6 seconds but the Canadians were hard to hold down and Taylor Bland was the winner nearly 2 seconds faster than the rest of the field.