The Virtual Equestrian - Eventing News - 2003 - Melbourne 3DE

Eventing News

2003 Horseland Melbourne International Three Day Event. 5th-9th June, 2003 Report - Page 1 Dressage
Friday's weather promised to spoil the 2003 Melbourne International Three Day Event as the weather man served up gale force winds and a dramatic drop in the temperature. We have become used to the beautiful autumn sunshine and the clear, crisp, still weather that makes this season a favourite for many. Obviously the program was scheduled to consider the 'what ifs' and we were all thankful of the fantastic facilities available at the National Equestrian Centre at Werribee Park. Saturday - day two of dressage, and all dressage tests were all ridden indoors. In pleasant sunny weather I think that much of the atmosphere is lost, but as Melbourne gave us a blast of early winter - the comfort and shelter from biting winds was much appreciated by competitors, horses and spectators alike. It is apparent that Event riders are focusing on the importance of a good dressage performance and we saw many polished, well prepared and ridden tests. The riders sat well and demonstrated an effective seat and mostly compliant horses. Below are a few horses from the CCI ***. Full credit must go to Tim Boland who gained first and fourth place after the dressage on Kildonan Tug and Limitless. The astute observer will know that this is no co-incidence - Tim has addresses the special training requirement of each of his horses and measured their work to produce Second place went to our Olympic favourite - Olivia Bunn on GV Top Of The Line.
Tim Boland on Kildonan Tug the winner after the dressage phase. Score 48.4	Pauline McKee on Mister Moss stride out well in their Extended Walk. They scored 70.2 for Dressage.
CIC-W World Cup Qualifier The lighting conditions in the indoor school are not ideal for taking clear, distance pics - this is particularly so in dull overcast conditions without full sunlight to brighten up everything. So these pix are published just to give an idea of how the combinations appeared at this moment in time.
The Ground Jury - from left Gillian Rolton, Jean Mitchell from Ireland and Barry Roycroft	The Event Director - Geoff Sinclair the CEO of Horseland - Congratulations of a great event !
Mike Sullivan - Chairman of the hard working Organising Committee - a great team effort, well done!	Russ Withers (right) and his team ... did a fantastic job on the commentary - it adds greatly to have a well briefed and knowledgeable person on the microphone.
Kate Boyes on AEA Inspector rode as a 'guinea pig' which enables the judges to get their eye in and familiarise themselves with the test - this is a great practice and should be part of every dressage competition.	Virbac were just one of the many sponsors who made the Melbourne International possible. Be sure to support them as without their support Australian horse sports will not flourish.
Kadi Eykamp on Iz'bella Roselini did a great dressage test for a score of 45.9 and 9th position after this phase.	Kadi Eykamp on Iz'bella Roselini after their test.
Luke Jones on his stunning grey Interloper warm up on the outdoor sand arena. They scored 54.1 for 10th place in the World Cup Qualifier	Wendy Schaeffer on Sun Shades put in a polished display in this phase of their three day test of skill and bravery. Wendy's experience shows and she scored 41.5 for second place after the dressage.
Uptrend and Chris Smith showed some love work out on the sand - can they show the same polish inside ... a score of 52.6 was a little below my expectation having seen the warm up. This put them into 8th place after the Dressage.	Michael Baker on GS Chevalier. Michael did a great job in this demanding phase. He gave Chevalier every opportunity to balance and give his best work - they achieved a 5th place on 51.1
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