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Latest News
7/20/2007
Team USA Packs an Early Punch with Five of Top Six Riders after Eventing’s Dressage Phase
Rio de Janeiro, Brazil – The American event riders got off to a fantastic start on July 20 at the XV Pan American Games taking the lead in the team portion of the competition and sweeping the top five places individually.
American combination Mara Dean riding Nicki Henley went to the head of a quality field of 27 horse-and-rider combinations riding before the ground jury of Barry Roycroft, Jo Young and Janine Rohr-Cicurel. Team members Stephen Bradley and From are second and Karen O’Connor riding Theodore O’Connor are third.
The most experienced rider on the squad, O’Connor, was second in the ring and got things off on the right foot for the U.S team with the adorable Theodore O’Connor. Owned by the Theodore O’Connor Syndicate, the 12-year-old hugely popular pony can’t move like some of the Warmblood horses, but he proved today that it doesn’t matter. O’Connor rode a very accurate test picking up scores of eights and nines for her halt at A.
“I was so proud of him,” said O’Connor after her test.
Never giving a point away, the pair got straight sevens and eights for the very valuable collective marks. A final score of 47.10 proved that the judges were prepared to reward a quality performance.
“His score was eight points better than Kentucky,” said O’Connor. “A lot of that is Mark’s influence [chef d’equipe Mark Philips], the three of us get a long really, really well... I’d like to think in the next six to eight months, I can improve it even more. Having the dressage people here with us, they told me they can help me get an extended trot out of him.”
Darren Chiacchia and Better I Do It (owned by Adrienne Iorio) were the second American combination in the arena. Chiacchia, the reigning Gold medalist from the 2003 Pan American Games, is riding again as an individual. He and Better I Do It, a 14-year-old Swedish Warmblood, put in a very workmanlike performance to end up fourth.
“I am very, very pleased,” said Chiacchia. “But, truth be told, I’m a little disappointed because he’s been so good in training.”
Quality trot transitions and an accurate rider made up for mistakes in both changes. They slipped in just behind Theodore O’Connor and Karen O’Connor on a score of 49.4.
“I’ve really been trying to get it to the next level,” he said. “But, whenever you up the grade a bit, it takes a while for that to get confirmed before you really have ownership of that at the competition. I, maybe, in a couple of places, got a little greedy looking for the new work, but maybe didn’t have the connection.”
Second team rider, Californian Gina Miles with Thomas Schulz and Laura Coates’ giant 13-year-old Irish Thoroughbred, McKinlaigh, filled up the ring with lots of movement and presence, but made a couple of mistakes that cost them a top score. McKinlaigh broke to canter in the first extended trot and picked up the canter instead of the trot after the halt at A. They received really good marks on some of their other work, and his fancy movement was rewarded in the collective marks. They finished on a score of 56.9, good enough for 11th place.
“I think that we put too much pressure on him out in the warm up,” said Miles who represented the U.S. as an individual at the World Equestrian Games. “We pushed him over the edge a little bit. So, obviously, I’m disappointed in my individual score, but the point I’m here for is to ride for the team, so I’m going to finish on that score.”
Stephen Bradley and Charlotte Harris’ From, the third team combination for the United States, put in a lovely, polished performance. Bradley, who was a member of the Gold medal team effort in 2003, used his experience to finesse a score of 46.5 out of the 15-year-old Russian Thoroughbred gelding who receive two eights for his first flying change. The pair also got eights for the halt at A and took advantage of very good canter work to go to the lead temporarily.
“I was real pleased w
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