January 24, 2007

Opening Day at the Winter Equestrian Festival

Class 1004/1.40m Jumper: $6,000– Table II, Sec. A

With a small group of foreign riders getting a feel for the Palm Beach turf in the second class, a 1m40Section A, the Internationale Arena welcomed Britain’s Louise Whitaker alongside Cian O’Connor and Kerins Darragh from Ireland – opening their accounts with 9th and 10th place respectively, riding Complete and Perquin – as well as Brazil’s Rodrigo Pessoa.

The latter was riding the stunning gray Coeur, an extremely talented horse that’s being touted as having Olympic potential for next year in China [Hong Kong for the equestrian events], and ertainly exhibited his jumping class, albeit in “schooling” mode in Pessoa’s capable hands to finished with a 15-fault total, including time penalties. There was no doubt, however, that there’s a lot more to come from this partnership.

The 56-horse line-up several old guard favorites, including Glasgow, who finished in the ribbons, fourth under the saddle of local resident, Norman Dello Joio. Victory, however, went to Beezie Madden who leapt into the lead at the mid-way point riding her mom Kathlene Patton’s Conquest II: a tough horse to beat any day of the week when he’s on form. The pair finished with a seven-second advantage ahead of U.S. World Cup and Olympic veteran with For The Moment, Lisa Jacquin riding Obourg for Flintwoode Farms. In third place, Louisana, ridden by 18-year-old Sloan Coles – a talented youngster who had the honor of being selected to participate in last week’s George Morris Horsemanship Clinic here at the Palm Beach Polo and Equestrian Club. Given the quality of this field, finishing in the ribbons in her first outing in the Internationale Arena at this year’s WEF was no mean feat.

For Beezie Madden, she was delighted to be back in Wellington. “It feels great, all the horses have had a nice break,” adding “Conquest felt super. Actually, he showed last year, but before that he had a year off with an injury (surgical removal of a fractured hind-leg splint bone), and he feels better now than at any time last year. He’s 16 now and I think we were lucky that it didn’t turn into a soft tissue injury because we caught it in time. He’s a funny guy because he’s lazy when he’s outside, but when he goes into the ring he’s really keen and ready go.”

Arriving five years ago from Maggie Ferguson, a student of Norman Dello Joio, Madden explained that Conquest was, “a bit too careful for her [Maggie], because she wanted to do big classes. I had a horse that was very scopey and not quite as careful as I would have liked, so we did a swap and it was good for both of us.”

With regard to her plans for this year, Madden confirmed that her first priority was the World Cup final “which is my goal with Authentic, then the Pan Am Games, but I’ll pick a different horse for that. Different goals for different horses this year.”

Results of Class 1004.1 1.40m Jumper Sec A - WEF/PBIEC Inaugural
January 24 - 28, 2007 - T/A: 79.00 – Internationale Arena

• 1 76 CONQUEST II BEEZIE MADDEN 0.00 62.647 KATHLEEN PATTON
• 2 556 OBOURG LISA JACQUIN 0.00 69.906 FLINTWOODE FARMS
• 3 62 LOUISIANA SLOANE COLES 0.00 70.819 JULIE COLES
• 4 386 GLASGOW NORMAN DELLO JOIO 0.00 71.247 GLASGOW GROUP
• 5 1516 AVAILABLE LEVANTOS MARIO DESLAURIERS 0.00 72.817 AVAILABLE JPRS.COM
• 6 796 GREAT PLEASURE HOLLY ORLANDO 0.00 73.592 SCOTT HAKIM
• 7 399 ACERTIJO NORMAN DELLO JOIO 0.00 74.332 J ADALBERTO ROIG JR
• 8 1639 ORLEANS LAUREN HUNKIN 0.00 74.653 RIDGEFIELD HOUSE
• 9 3031 COMPLETE CIAN O'CONNOR 0.00 77.259 CASTLEMARTIN STUD
• 10 500 ORLANDO DARRAGH KERINS 0.00 77.428 DOUBLE H FARM
• 11 290 CHURCH ROAD MAX AMAYA 0.00 78.307 SARAH BECKER
• 12 891 HUMOUR DU PARC KATIE PRUDENT 1.00 79.563 MAX HAURI