Australian Boyd Exell has defended his world champion driving title at theAlltech FEI World Equestrian Games for the third consecutive year.
No cones to spare
On the final day of driving in the cones competition, there was not much room between the top two. Chester, who led after the dressage fell just three penalties behind Boyd following a disappointing run in the marathon. But his clean performance round the cones left Boyd with no room for error.
True to form Boyd delivered a spectacular round, which although was not the fastest of the day, was enough to secure him the number one position on the podium.
Boyd descibed his relief at the end: “I’m hugely relieved after a week that went well, but was not perfect.”
Third and fourth place went to the Dutch drivers Theo Timmerman and IJsbrand Chardon respectively.
Team GBR
The best of the Brits, Wilf Bowman Ripley put in a fantastic display of horsemanship to steer his four horses to second place in the cones competition. Wilf confessed to H&C after the marathon phase to not having his ‘A-Team’ at the competition. Despite this he produced a superb clear round inside the time, pulling him up from 18thto 15thplace.
Wilf commented on his cones test: “I was feeling confident and had nothing to lose, so I just pushed on and went for it. It’s been hard work from start to finish. I think I’ve put in the best performance I could do with the situation I’ve had, so I’m really pleased. The competition’s been fantastic with a lot of sportsmanship in the driving, which has been good.”
Team mate Georgina Hunt did not have the same success and had two obstacles down to finish just outside the time with 6.79pen.
Speaking after her cones test Georgina said: “I was very disappointed, two down just wasn’t good enough. Number two [the second cone obstacle] I didn’t realise it was down, but saw it as I came past. I knew I was tight on time, so I tried to come in tight for 19, and had that one down as well. I should have stuck to my line and not worried about the time and at least not had 19 down, so wrong decision. It’s a horrid way to end.”
Dutch out on top
The team competition was won by the Dutch squad with a huge 20 penalty margin. Team mates IJsbrand Chardon, Koos de Ronde and Theo Timmerman led from day one and second placed Germany had too much ground to make up coming into the final test and couldn’t catch the leaders.
The British teams combined score was only enough for eighth place out of the 13 teams competing.