Wellington, Fla. - The United States is poised for a successful week at the Winter Equestrian Festival’s $150,000 FEI Nations Cup. CSIO4* Wellington will host the prestigious competition Friday evening with seven teams vying for the spot atop the podium. The Hermès U.S. Show Jumping Team of Georgina Bloomberg, Audrey Coulter, Laura Kraut, and Beezie Madden have drawn second in the order.

“We have a similarly strong team to our [winning] Ocala Nations Cup team," said Chef d’Equipe Robert Ridland. "Here we have four different horses: Beezie is fine tuning Simon, who has been jumping great. Georgina will lead us off with Lilli, a mare she knows really well. Laura will bring her mare, who jumped great in the warm-up this week. This will be the mare’s first Nations Cup, but she really doesn’t act like green horse. Audrey, who is the youngest rider on team, will be competing with hometown pressure for first time, but she performed really well on teams last summer. Overall, I am looking forward to it, I think we have a really good team.”

Pathfinding for the U.S. will be Bloomberg (New York, N.Y.) with Gotham Enterprizes, LLC’s Lilli, a 2004 Deutsches Sportpferd mare. In 2015, the pair made their first team experience at a major international competition a memorable one, earning a Team Bronze medal at the Pan American Games.

Following in the order will be Coulter (San Francisco, Calif.) with Copernicus Stables, LLC’s Capital Colnardo, a 2005 Holsteiner stallion. Coulter has had the ride on Capital Colnardo for a little over a year and has been building the partnership both stateside and in Europe. This will be Coulter’s third time representing the U.S. on a senior Nations Cup team, having competed at CSIO3*-W Bratislava and CSIO5* Gijón last summer.

Team veteran Kraut (Royal Palm Beach, Fla.) will ride a rising talent in her barn, Old Willow Farms, LLC’s Zeremonie, a 2007 Holsteiner mare. The pair spent much of 2015 competing in Europe where they marked multiple top 10 placings.

Anchoring the U.S. Team will be Madden (Cazenovia, N.Y.) with Abigail Wexner’s Simon, a 1999 KWPN gelding. Madden and Simon are a seasoned pair with a resume that includes the 2013 Rolex/FEI World Cup Jumping Final champion title. In 2015, they won the CP $1 Million Grand Prix FEI CSI5*, presented by Wells Fargo at HITS-on-the-Hudson and the $150,000 Longines FEI World Cup Qualifier at Del Mar.

Find out more about the U.S. athletes

The FEI Nations Cup competition gets underway at 7:00 p.m. ET at the Palm Beach International Equestrian Center. Watch the competition live at pbiec.coth.com.