NZ EQUESTRIAN News


Defending Champions in Pole Position
Saturday, 5 October 2019


Cross country day often causes many changes on the horse trials score board, and today was no exception at the Canterbury Agricultural Park for the Mitavite Springston Trophy pony club teams competition.

Lying second after yesterday's dressage phase, the defending champions View Hill Red have once again hit the top of the leader board, pushing the dressage leaders Kaiapoi Black into second place, some 13.65 points behind them.

Five of the View Hill Red team jumped clear rounds with no time faults, and team captain, Jordan Shrimpton said the riders all enjoyed the challenge of tackling the brand new cross country course today. “We all thought cantering over the ramp to go into the main Oval was amazing, and then over the Mitavite jumps in the Oval, that was a real highlight. Then when turning the corner into the water, and suddenly you saw all these people everywhere!”

The team has been training hard for this competition. “We usually have training that involves Liz Thomas, Beci Thomas and Anne Cochrane, they do a phase each and we circle through and do all the three phases. We were able to apply that training today.”

There is also very good team spirit. “It is really cool as we have got two sets of siblings in our team. We all spend so much time together, it is just like we are one big family. As cheesy as that sounds, that is really how it is,” said Jordan. “My little sister Elise has never done anything like this before, and after seeing all the media releases and the publicity, she said “the pressure is on isn’t it!” We are very proud that she rode so well under that pressure. This has been the highlight of her year, she has been working towards it for a long time.”

As to the show jumping phase tomorrow, Jordan was hoping it would go well for them. “We have a wee bit of a name for ourselves as not being great show jumpers, but again, we have put the hours in, we have had weekly training for six or seven weeks now including lots of show jumping training.”

The cross country course was a very good test of the riders, and there was no one fence that caused too much trouble. As Olympian Clarke Johnstone predicted on Thursday when he walked the course with the riders, one of the early combination fences with a corner as the second element did catch a few of the senior riders, mainly due to their approaches to the fence. However those that did take his advice of riding a curving line made it look easy.

Two teams who will be justifiably proud of their efforts today are Pleasant Point and Amberley. While they only had four riders in two age groups, none of their riders incurred any faults at all on the cross country.

Halswell Pony Club is hosting this year’s Springston Trophy and so are delighted that one of their teams, the Halswell Crusaders is sitting in third place, right behind Kaiapoi Black.

Riders had a very encouraging message from another Olympian this morning before they set off for the cross country phase. Jonelle Price posted a special message on social media from England. “Like so many, Pony Club is where it all began…. I am now a proud patron of the New Zealand Pony Clubs Association and this week, am thinking of and sending lots of good vibes to the 200+ children lining up at the Mitavite Springston Trophy. For those South Island kids, it is a highlight of the equestrian calendar, just like it was many years ago for both Tim and I.”

Show jumping phase starts tomorrow at 9am and it is expected the team parade (horses and riders) and the prize giving should be at 2pm and will be held in the main Oval at the showgrounds.


Standings after dressage and cross country:
1. View Hill 121.16
2. Kaiapoi Black 134.81
3. Halswell Crusaders 136.85
4. Eyreton Navy 141.40
5. Halswell West Melton Weedons 145.01
6. View Hill White 150.72
7. View Hill Black 153.21
8. North Otago Motueka Composite 164.14
9. Kaiapoi View Hill 167.60
10. Eyreton Turquoise 168.82

Full results available on this link: http://www.springston-trophy.org.nz/new/info/2019/teamresults.htm