Mclain Ward And Achat 6 Win High Jump, But 83-Year Old Record Stands - Page 2

At 6' 5", Vale went clear, Minikus again cleared it on his second attempt; Ward sailed over it cleanly. Stephens had a refusal and withdrew. King knocked two rails down and retired. Shepherd rocked it hard, but was clear.

At 7' 2", Vale knocked two rails down in his first try and on his second attempt, he crashed the fence, fell and retired, leaving the field on foot grinning. Minikus crashed the fence, landed shaken out of the tack, and as the horse galloped towards the ingate, he tried to dismount but was left hanging on the right side with the left leg in the stirrup; when he disengaged, he ended up underneath his horse's hooves. He limped off the field, shunning help. Ward had a rail, but cleared it on his second attempt. Shepherd knocked down the rails, breaking one, and when she had rails again in the second attempt, she retired.

At this point, Ward had won the class, but he decided to go for the record. At 1:15 am, the fence was set at 7' 5". He attempted it twice, but a rail fell each time. Then he asked for the fence to be raised to the world record height, 8' 2". He made one attempt - but though Achat jumped the fence, he did not clear it, and Ward ended up on the ground. He stood up immediately and made the baseball umpire's hand signal for "safe" to indicate that he was unhurt.

Ward said that he attempted the record even though the horse did not clear the lower fence because Achat was jumping well. "He was actually jumping 7' 5". He was coming off the ground great. That's the whole question – how they're coming off the ground," explained Ward. "He kept not being able to follow through enough behind. He kept just rubbing it behind. But it wasn't an ugly rail. And I thought well, he had a nice little rub on it, I don't want to waste too much more energy. I know I wanted to go for it because he wasn't hesitant off the ground at all tonight. He was taking it on like a bearcat. So that's what we said we were going to try to attempt to do, and he made a great attempt."