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Sunburst Equestrian Newsletter - April 2008

April 2008 fulfilled the promise of being a huge month with a day’s intensive jump training with Jamie Coman prior to the SA State Showjumping Championships at the Strathalbyn Polo grounds beginning the month in fine style.

My jumping mare, “Koyuna Sun Set” stepped up beautifully at these Championships to jump 2 clear rounds in the warm-up 1.25m and 1.35m classes on the Friday (but did not jump off to save her for the big classes!), run 2nd to Anthony Thomas & “Sandstones” in Saturday’s Grand Prix and then win the SA State Championships Grand Prix by jumping the only 3 clear rounds. Michelle Clark’s “Belcam Gambler” was the first of three to jump-off against the clock and put in an excellent round until just rolling the top rail off the final vertical which at 1.60m was an intimidating fence.

I knew that I would be unable to match Michelle on time at this stage of my young mare’s jumping career but was able to seize the window of opportunity to win the title with a clear round albeit some 5 seconds slower. I had put some pressure on the final rider, Anthony and “Sandstones” as I had taken an angled line at the oxer at fence 2 and an inside turn to the vertical at 3. Anthony then faulted at fence 2 and retired leaving “Koyuna Sun Set” and I State Champions!

“Koyuna Sun Storm” then capped off a successful weekend with a win in the final B & C Gd class which in addition to her win in Friday’s 1.25m and 4th in the 1.35m helped elevate me to the most successful rider of the show along with “Koyuna Sun Shine” who also had two 2nd placings in the C Gd and C Gd Championships and a 4th in the 1.25m class.

The following Saturday the Grand Cru Horse Trials committee generously allowed Megan Jones and I on our Olympic hopefuls “Kirby Park Jester” and Kirby Park Allofasudden” and “Koyuna Sun Magic”, “Koyuna Sun Dancer” and “Koyuna Sun Shine” respectively to run through the 3* B test in preparation for the Sydney International Horse Trials CCI*** the following week.

My brother, Tony’s wedding to his stunning bride, Christy Powell on April 13 was a perfect day even if I did have to start at 5am to gallop my Sydney horses prior to the wedding preparations! Christy had generously invited my mother and I to join in the hair and make up session for the bridal party which certainly set a fun mood for the day. I had my thick, curly hair straightened which took over 30 mins so I can’t see doing that very often but it doesn’t hurt to do the ‘girly’ thing occasionally. My mum even coped with the ‘natural’ make up look and a touch-up to her hair!

Tony’s best man, Stephen Dickinson sang a beautiful rendition of U2’s “All I want is you” to commence the wedding procession which was staged at the picturesque Glen Ewin Estate, north-east of Adelaide. Christy looked amazing as she walked to Tony through an informal corridor of guests and I can remember thinking that I wouldn’t want to be walking ‘down the aisle’ towards anyone less attractive than my gorgeous brother if I was ever to get married! I was extremely proud of my ‘little’ brother (at 2 and a half years younger) and believe they will share a wonderful life together and make beautiful babies!

Leaving for Sydney at midday the day after the wedding was a tall order as was riding two dressage lessons with Harry Boldt on my elite squad event horses, “Koyuna Sun Magic” and “KoyunaSun Dancer” the next morning at the Sydney International Equestrian Centre (SIEC) after having done an ‘overnighter’ arriving at the venue 7:15am Tuesday. I struggled to make it through early afternoon which included changing into my dressage competition attire for a photo shoot with New Idea magazine as part of an Olympic special before grabbing some much needed sleep!

As part of the Return of the Horse Festival, the Sydney International Horse Trials was run in conjunction with the Australian Showjumping Championships – just to keep myself busy I entered “Koyuna Sun Set” in the Grand Prix series as well as my three event horses in the CCI.

“Koyuna Sun Set” started my competition week off well with a clear round in the Table C (Speed) class to finish 4th on Thursday. I was confident that my event horses were working as well as they could both during the High Performance squad sessions with Harry on Tuesday and Wednesday mornings and then Wednesady afternoon and Thursday with my private Dressage Coach, Di Jenkyn who had come down from Queensland to help me and Natalie Siiankoski in the CCI***.

Again, I was happy with all 3 of my dressage tests but not so happy with Dancer & Fox’s scores of 53.5 and 54.1 which were somewhat off their best though Shine’s score of 48 for 7th place was her best yet.

Fortunately, I was then able to focus on the 2nd round of the Grand Prix jumping where “Koyuna Sun Set” excelled to jump 2 clear rounds to place 2nd to Chris Chugg’s “Vivant” and contributed well to the successful SA/VIC team consisting of fellow SA rider, Amy Graham and “Transatlantic”, Becky Allen and “Koyuna Ted” and Brook Dobbin and “GP Shine.”

Cross Country Day went smoothly despite the conditions being a little wet and slippery from the consistent rain. “Koyuna Sun Dancer,” “Koyuna Sun Magic” and Koyuna Sun Shine” all jumped clear rounds close to the time with 7.2, 4 and 4.8 time faults respectively to elevate them to 6th, 5th and 4th placings overnight which was a great improvement on their dressage placings!

Dressage leader Shane Rose and “All Luck” was the only combination inside the time to increase their lead while Sonja Johnson and “Ringwould Jaguar” had 3.6 to move into 2nd ahead of Megan Jones and “Kirby Park Jester” whose 10.8 time dropped them to 3rd. The main surprise of the class came Sunday morning when “All Luck” failed the final Veterinary inspection to leave Shane still needing a qualification for the Olympics.

Showjumping proved difficult to jump clear with only 3 clear of 24 starters – “Koyuna Sun Dancer” and “Koyuna Sun Magic” were clear along with Natalie Siiankoski and “Kolora Stud Archie” who also zoomed around Cross Country clear with just 1.2 time to come up to an overall 6th place. “Koyuna Sun Shine”, “Kirby Park Irsih Jester” and “Ringwould Jaguar” all had one fence down to finish 3rd, 2nd and 1st respectively.

“Koyuna Sun Set” then finished the weekend in spectacular style when she saved me through the penultimate treble combination during the first round of the National Championship Grand Prix – I had become unseated over the brick wall (the b element) in the middle of the combination but despite me literally hanging around her neck before finally rebalancing she remained entirely focused on jumping the oxer out, unfortunately just coming down on the back rail with her belly.

Reunited, we then continued down to the last fence – a light beam over a gate which many horses had faulted at, jumped it cleanly and recorded one of 6 4-fault rounds to contest the second round.

A back rail down at the 2nd fence marred an otherwise smooth, careful round which left us in 4th place behind National Champions, Chris Chugg & “Vivant”, Julia Hargreaves and “Copabella Hayman” and Chris again on “Alloundra”. Overall, we finished 2nd on the Grand Prix leaderboard to “Vivant” which was an amazing - and rather humbling - result for an eventer!

I returned from a hectic week at Sydney only to go straight back into full competition mode, jumping 6 horses at the “President’s Cup” Showjumping weekend again at the Strathalbyn Polo grounds. “Koyuna Sun Storm” was very impressive recording 5 clear rounds for the weekend including the only 2 clear rounds in the President’s Cup to give me my second big Showjumping win for the month!

“Lord of the Sun” returned to the competition arena for a consistent weekend’s jumping to record clear rounds for a 1st, 2nd, 3rd and 4th placing in his D Grade – 1.2m classes which upgraded him to C grade. Kristi Ebner’s “Tenacious D” was victorious in a D Grade class and also scored a 3rd and 4th placing for the weekend. “Glenrose Sun Devil” gained some important jumping ‘miles’ for a 4th placing and youngster “Kirsyl Sun” jumped some pleasing rounds over the technical tracks in the main arena.