There are plenty of New Zealanders entered in the prestigious Mitsubishi Motors Badminton Horse Trials, including two first timers. There are eight New Zealanders entered, with Andrew Nicholson, Caroline Powell and Sir Mark Todd all having two horses in the list at the moment.
The new fresh faces for New Zealand to the list are Andy Daines with Spring Panorama, and Virginia Thompson with Star Nouveau.
Dan Jocelyn has Dassett Cool Touch, Andrew Nicholson has Jet Set and last year’s winner, Nereo entered, and Caroline Powell has On the Brash and Up Up and Away. The Prices have two in, Jonelle is riding Classic Moet with Tim on Ringwood Sky Boy. Sir Mark has Kiltubrid Rhapsody and Leonidas II.
Ginny (aged 27) says she expects to be away from New Zealand for about two years, and is just taking the one horse over at this stage. While she and Paige have competed at a four-star before in Adelaide, finishing 8th and was the first to fly through a tricky combination, she hasn’t even attended Badminton as a spectator, saying she has “watched many videos.” It has become very real now with the entry list being released this morning.
There are four Australian entries, including Lissa Green who has elected to ride for Australia, thanks to having Australian David Green as a father. Her mother is also pretty famous, Lucinda has won Badminton six times on six different horses! The other Australians are Sam Griffiths (Paulank Brockagh), Paul Tapner (Bonza King of Rouges) and Bill Levett (Alexander NJ).
Great Britain of course has the largest number of entrants including Oliver Townend, who has entered four (but will only ride two). He has won here before and has his Burghley champion, Ballaghmor Class entered. The four members of the British team that won the European gold medal in 2017 are entered – Ros Canter, Gemma Tattersall and Tina Cook.
There are eight previous winners in the field including two who are currently on the wait list – Pippa Funnell (Billy Beware) and William Fox-Pitt (Fernhill Pimms). There are only 14 on the wait list this year so it is expected that both will get a run going on previous entry list changes.
The event is on 2-6 May, and hopefully the English weather will have improved from its current snowy conditions.
So it promises to be another gripping Badminton horse trials, and we wish everyone the best of luck there but of course, extra good luck to our Kiwis!
