Kai Ruder leads on day one at Strzegom
After the very intense heat wave during the event in mid-June 2016, there are close to perfect conditions starting off this year’s event at Strzegom with sunny weather around 25 degrees with a bit of a breeze keeping horses, riders, officials, volunteers and spectators in a happy mood. Fingers crossed it will last all week.
Today has been all about getting all the bits and pieces together as the Ground Jury members have been doing the cross country course walk during the day together with the Strzegom course designer Marcin Konarski.
As often with Marcin´s XC courses there are many aspects to consider and focus is the key. It doesn’t matter if you are riding a short 1* or a long 3*, both horse and rider will have to be on their toes (or their hooves) because in this state of the art course the fences turn up fast and there are many twists and turns.
Listening in to the ground jury members during today’s cross country course walk we can honestly say that we have a great week ahead of us. As one of the jury members concluded – “it´s a proper test” and that goes for both horse and rider. This cross country is strong, solid and technical with lots of corners demanding a full focus from start to finish. A small breather is included but then it´s back to business again for the second half of the courses. The water complexes are generous with lots of fences coming swiftly at the riders both in and out and will leave no room for hesitation. All in all it is a cross country that surely has the Konarski design all the way.
Today also saw the start of CIC 2* dressage with some 25 riders starting and another 45 riders following in the same class tomorrow. After the first day, we have to take our hats off to the German riders who managed six out of the eight top positions with Kai Rüder in first and second places followed by Jan Kaminski in third.
Finishing off today is the first horse inspection for the CI Long 3* and last but not least the DRAW for the first leg of this year’s FEI Nations Cup that starts on Friday
- 261 horses / entries from 18 countries
- 6 XC courses from CI-short 1* to CI-long 3* and Nations Cup
- 140 fences, all being sponsored by some 30 sponsors/ partners
If you cannot make it - don’t worry! You can join Strzegom Horse Trials live on their website
