In a thrilling finish to the Scottish Open championship at the Blair Castle International horsetrials, British Olympic rider Nicola Wilson denied the home crowd a local victory by a margin of one second.
Having won the CIC*** championships at Blair on three previous occasions, Nicola was odds-on favourite to top the competition and she ultimately nailed the win on Gerry and Mary Kemp and Janine Shewan’s gelding One Two Many.
“He is a phenomenal horse,” said Nicola of the 12-year-old, which has finished third in the open intermediate classes at Oasby (1) and (2) and at Allerton, and was recently second in the CIC at Burgham.
“He is lovely in all three phases. It is especially pleasing for his owners and I am so lucky to have such an amazing support team my owners, husband, groom as we all ride the highs and lows together.”
Nicola, who was headed from Highland Perthshire to the Alltech FEI World Equestrian games in Normandy to represent great Britain riding Annie Clover, had four horses entered across the Scottish Open CIC*** class at Blair.
However, she chose to withdraw her popular former two-time Blair winner and london Olympic partner Opposition Buzz prior to the cross country.
With competitors running in reverse order of merit in this section, Nicola had left the start box with a small pocket of time in hand over Fife-based Wills Oakden.
Wills had partnered David Kenwright and Sylvia Douglas’s mare Greystone Midnight Melody to rise up the rankings from 14th position after dressage to eighth following a clear showjumping round.
After posting the fastest cross country round of the class, stopping the clock just seven seconds over the optimum time to incur 2.8 time penalties,
Wills returned to the clubhouse to endure a nail-biting wait to see if the remaining seven competitors could better his final score of 51.6. With time penalties proving vital, Wills climbed to third.
When last year’s winners Lucinda Fredericks and Flying Finish came home slowly, he could almost touch his championship dream.
However, timing her round “to perfection”, Nicola used all her available margin of 8.3 penalties equivalent to 20 seconds beyond the optimum time to pip Wills by 0.3 penalties.
“I knew I had done all that I could when I came off the cross country,” said Wills.
“Finishing second is just amazing and it’s a great reward for the true team effort we’ve all enjoyed this week.
“I want to give a huge thanks to my grooms Lynne Cree, Sarah Murray and Isaac Ratcliffe-Smith for making Blair 2014 such a brilliant year. they’ve juggled five horses across the international horse trials competition and two more in the
showjumping arenas, too.”
Having gone the direct route from the influential sunken road to arrowhead skinny towards the end of Ian Stark’s refreshed take on the ‘traditional’ Blair cross country course, Wills said he did not think there was anywhere he could have found the extra one second that might have snatched the win.
“Molly gave me such a great ride and I know her owner/breeders David and Sylvia will be so thrilled and proud to have a horse competing and doing so well at this level.
“I’ve ridden her since pre-novice level having ridden her sire greystone Pathfinder for them around the CCI* at Blair, too,” he added.
Reflecting on their progression this season, Wills said Molly truly felt “herself again” after an uncharacteristic fall in the heavy going at Bramham International back in June.
“She can be a sensitive horse, so we took her back to open novice level to rebuild her confidence, taking a win at Hopetoun but she was really firing on all cylinders across country at Blair. She’s got a huge gallop in her.
“I loved the new layout and the clockwise route for the cross country,” added Wills.
“It rode with a much better flow but remained really respectful of the ‘traditional’ Blair cross country.”
By taking second in the final line-up, Wills who is based at Dunbog, outside Newburgh won the prize for highestplaced great British rider under 25 and was also recognised once again as the highest placed Scottish rider for 2014.
Meanwhile, Lynne’s efforts behind the scenes for Wills’ string of horses in the CCI* class including Annabel Sall and Mike Bain’s horse Nordic Diamond Dan (8th) and Andrew Malcolm’s Diamond Sam (40th) also earned her the groom’s
prize for this level.
Another quick cross country round, coupled to a double clear jumping performance, allowed Herefordshire’s Louise Harwood to move up from 17th position to overall third for the CIC*** with her own 12-year-old gelding Mr Potts.
“He gallops really well across country,” said Louise. “But he can hang to the left in the air when he gets a little tired, which loses us a little time. this is easily his best CIC*** result to date.”
Further down the leaderboard, Wills also completed the cross country with a clean jumping sheet with Debbie Whalley’s 11-year-old grey, Merikano.
Adding 11.2 time to a pole in the showjumping arena, they rose from 15th after dressage to finish in 12th overall.
“Bertie just jumped in quite steeply to the sunken road complex before the final water, so I made a quick decision to swing away from the direct route to the skinny arrowhead,” said Wills.
“We lost a little time going this longer route but he jumped brilliantly.”
Finishing just a few places behind in 15th was Lanarkshire rider Olivia Wilmot with her own 13-year-old Cool Dancer, while young Perthshire rider Stephanie O’Neil completed in 35th spot on Millridge Auroras Diamond and Kinross’s Grace
Moran achieved her best dressage to date with Porthill Rusty Nail to begin their CIC*** Blair campaign on 51.6 penalties.
After taking their time on the cross country they completed in 38th from the initial 67 entries.
equestrian@thecourier.co.ukResults
Scottish Open
Championship CIC***
(67 entries)
1 Nicola Wilson, One Two Many, 43.3,0,0,8.0=51.3.
2 Wills Oakden, (Fife) Greystone Midnight Melody, 48.8,0,0,2.8=51.6.
3 Louise Harwood, Mr Potts, 49.6,0,0,6.8 =56.4.
…
12 Wills Oakden, Merikano, 49,4,0,11.2=64.2. 15 Olivia Wilmot (Lanarkshire), Cool Dancer, 53.1,4,0,9.2=66.3. 35 Stephanie O’Neil (Perthshire), Millridge Auroras Diamond, 64.6,8,0,21.2= 93.8. 38 Grace Moran (Kinross), Porthill Rusty
Nail, 51.6,17,0,27.2 =95.8.