Mark Todd leads Kiwi team to victory

New Zealand has won the third leg of the FEI Nations Cup series at Houghton International in Norfolk (24 May), with Sir Mark Todd taking the individual honours.

Pole position

The Kiwis led from the start, establishing an 11pen lead after the first phase. Mark’s dressage score of 32.3pen with his London 2012 partner NZB Campino put him in pole position. The pair added just 3.6 time penalties to their final score, to win the CCI*** with nearly five penalties in hand.

Team mate Lizzie Brown took second place with Henton Attorney General – who was theonly horse to finish the cross-country inside the optimum time.Squad debutant Craig Nicolai (Just Ironic) and Tim Price (Haddon Trump Card) finished 21st and 22nd.

The team’s strong performance gave them a convincing victory, finishing 17.6pen ahead of Germany in second place. Britain, who were hoping for a hat-trick of home wins, had to settle for third with France in fourth.

Good feeling

“It was a good competition,” said Mark Todd. “The course wasn’t that big, but it caused a few problems here and there and the time wasn’t easy because of the heavy rain. It was a good feeling to have the Germans and Brits below us on the podium. Let’s hope it stays that way this summer!”

Emily Llewellyn, who went clear on the cross-country and showjumping, was the highest placed of the British squad, taking sixth place on Junior ll.

Ros Canter (Zenshera) and Dani Evans (Smart Time) both had four faults in the showjumping to come ninth and 14, respectively. David Doel had a run-out on the cross-country and one down in the show jumping with Koyuna Sun Magic, which put him in 36th place.

Equal first

Great Britain and France have competed in every leg of the FEI Nations Cup 2014 series so far and are currently in equal first place with 27 points. The next leg is at Strzegom, Poland on 26-29 June.

In other classes over the four-day show, Will Furlong and Livingstone II were crowned the new National Under 21 Champions. Sophie Beaty was the runner-up with Stanly, while Isabella Innes Ker was third riding Rosses Captain.

The CCI** was won by Lara de Liedekerke and the eight-year-old stallion Averouge des Quatre Chênes, ahead of Matthew Wright and Andrew Nicholson in second and third place.

Early lead

Nations Cup team member Ros Canter won the CCI* with Cekatinka. The top three places had less than three penalty points between them, with Pippa Funnell taking second place and John-Paul Sheffield in third.

“I’m never confident of a win but I knew coming there that if I could get the flatwork nailed on the day, Cekatinka is a good jumper and we could do well,” said Ros. “It’s the first time I have led from the front, but being in the Nations Cup team was a great distraction and stopped me getting too nervous.”