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It was another busy weekend August 11-13 for the Adequan USEA Gold Cup Series, with the action taking place on both coasts at the Millbrook Horse Trials and the Woodside Eventing Summer Horse Trials.

Held August 11-13 at The Horse Park at Woodside, in Woodside, California, the Woodside Eventing Summer Horse Trials hosted both Intermediate and Advanced Gold Cup divisions. Gina Miles, making the trip from Creston, California with longtime partner McKinlaigh, swept the Advanced division starting with a nearly unheard of dressage score of 24.6! With 5.6 time penalties on cross-country, they entered the show jumping arena with three rails in hand, needing only one of them. Ending on a score of 34.2, Miles and McKinlaigh bested the rest of the competition by more than 14 points. (Gina and McKinlaigh are pictured at the right jumping the skinny after the second water at The Fork last spring.)

Owners Thom Schulz and Miles must be very proud of their 12-year-old liver chestnut Irish Sport Horse gelding, especially considering the win put them on top of the Gold Cup Advanced Leaderboard with 835 points, dethroning last year’s Advanced Gold Cup year-end champion, Phillip Dutton, who was bumped down to fourth place on the Leaderboard with House Doctor after all the weekend’s action. Miles has had an impressive run of luck at Gold Cup events this year with a fourth place at The Fork Horse Trials in April, and a win at The Event at Rebecca Farm in July to add to her Woodside victory.

With a score of 48.3, Hawley Bennett and her 16-year-old bay Thoroughbred gelding Livingstone were Miles’ closet competition. Bennett, of Langley, British Columbia, accrued eight time penalties on cross-country and dropped one rail in show jumping to secure the red ribbon in the event and push her and Livingstone up to second place on the Gold Cup Advanced Leaderboard with 725 points, after accruing previous points for a fourth place at Galway Downs in March and a third place at Rebecca Farm.

In the Woodside Intermediate division Ballinakill Glory carried Bodega Bay, California resident Kelly Prather to victory. Owned by Andrea Pfeiffer, the seven-year-old 16.2-hand Irish Sport Horse bay mare shined in dressage with the lowest dressage score (23.1) in her division. The pair went clean on cross-country, and then added four jumping penalties and seven time faults in show jumping for a final score of 34.1. While she may have won her division, first continues to elude Prather on the Gold Cup Intermediate Leaderboard, where she stands in second with a score of 275, just 15 points behind leaders Becky Holder and Rejuvenate who won the CIC*** in July at the Maui Jim Horse Trials.

Just missing first to slide into second place by less than a point was Jolie Sexson on Killian O’Connor. From Martinez, California, the pair had a great round with a score of 29.6 in dressage, and added just 4.8 time penalties on cross-country to end with a score of 34.4. The eight-year-old 17-hand gray Selle Francais/Thoroughbred is jointly owned by Sexson and Tracy Bruning Bowman.

Miles and Prather earned a long list of prizes for their wins, which for the Gold Cup Series included $500 cash, and from Series sponsors: a seven-dose pack of Adequan, a Mountain Horse jacket with Gold Cup logo, a front and hind pair of Nunn Finer American Style brushing boots, and the choice of either a Cross-Country Sereno Top Ride pad with ultra-suede, or the Cross-Country Ortho Top Ride saddle pad with advanced memory foam from new sponsor, Ogilvy Horse.

For their second place finishes Sexson and Bennett earned from Gold Cup sponsors a front and hind pair of Nunn Finer brushing boots, along with choice of a Sereno dressage, cross-country, or show jumping pad from Ogilvy Horse.

For complete results, visit Woodside’s website at www.horsepark.org.

Millbrook Horse Trials

Over the Rocky Mountains, the Great Plains, the Mississippi River, and the Appalachian Mountains, another Adequan USEA Gold Cup event was being held the same weekend in Millbrook, New York. Due to the number of entries, the Millbrook Horse Trials hosted two Advanced Gold Cup divisions. Darren Chiacchia, from Springville, New York, rode Windfall to victory with a score of 40.70 in the Advanced Division A. Not surprisingly the pair had another impressive dressage score, this time 26.30. Their cross-country round ended with time faults amounting to 14.4, but they jumped double clear in show jumping to take home the blue. After the dust settled this weekend, Windfall, a 14-year-old black Trakehner stallion owned by Dr. Timothy Holekamp, stands in third with Chiacchia on the Gold Cup Advanced Leaderboard with 670 points, after a win at The Fork Horse Trials in April. (Darren and Windfall are pictured at the left jumping The Turtle in the first water at The Fork last spring.)

Buck Davidson and Private Treaty took second place in the Millbrook Advanced Division A, moving up from a tie for 13th after dressage by putting in the fastest cross-country ride of the division (just 6.4 time penalties) and dropping just one rail in show jumping for a final score of 52.9. This performance moved Davidson and the ten-year-old Thoroughbred gelding owned by Luke Allen into the fifth spot on the Gold Cup Advanced Leaderboard with 505 points, after a second place finish at the Maui Jim Horse Trials in July.

Peter Atkins and Figjam came all the way from Reddick, Florida to squeak out a win in Millbrook’s Advanced Division B. The ten-year-old bay Thoroughbred gelding, owned by Kaizen Farm, added 9.6 time penalties on cross-country to his dressage score of 37.1 for a final total of 46.7 points. Kristen Bond and her eight-year-old Oldenburg gelding Are You Ready were right on their heels after moving up from 23rd place after dressage (out of 27), and going double clear in cross-country and show jumping to finish on a final score of 47.5. Those performances earned Atkins and Figjam a 16th place post on the Gold Cup Advanced Leaderboard, and put Bond and Are You Ready into a tie for ninth.

For complete Millbrook results, visit their website at www.millbrookhorsetrials.com.

Only three events remain on the 2006 Adequan USEA Gold Cup Series schedule, one in each division: Central - Richland Horse Trials August 25-27 in Richland, Michigan; Atlantic – Poplar Place Horse Trials September 8-10 in Hamilton, Georgia; and Pacific – Twin Rivers Horse Trials September 29-October 1 in Paso Robles, California.

This December, at the USEA Annual Meeting and Convention in St. Louis, Missouri, a grand prize Gold Cup trophy and Amerigo saddle will be awarded to the rider from each division with the most points at the end of the year. In addition, the Gold Cup champion at the advanced level receives a check from the USEA for $6,000, and the intermediate champion receives a check for $4,000. Both winners will also receive an additional supply of Adequan. The second placed rider at Advanced wins a $3,500 Bit of Britain gift certificate, and their Intermediate counterpart wins a $2,500 gift certificate, and both will also receive an additional supply of Adequan.

To see the complete Gold Cup Series Leaderboard, visit the Gold Cup page on the USEA website, or click here.

The Adequan USEA Gold Cup Series would not be possible without the support of its sponsors: Title, Adequan; Presenting: Amerigo, Nunn Finer, and Nutrena; Contributing: Cover-All, Premier Equestrian, UlcerGard, and Wellpride; and Patron: Mountain Horse, and Ogilvy.

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