Oh Canada…… I don’t know if any team has ever had six clear rounds in the history of the WEG. WE ROCKED. Not only that but they made it look easy. Horse after Canadian horse went out and romped around the cross country. It was a joy to watch and a joy to listen to the people around me as they slowly woke up to the fact that Canada was coming home clean and fast with every horse. Three double clears and three clears with minimum time penalties. WHAT A DAY!!!
First Selena which of course just makes me sooooo nervous. I don’t know that I am actually nervous about her being hurt, that’s a place you just don’t go. It’s more a fear of a glance off at a corner, or a line that wasn’t just right. One stop is SO easy to have, even with the best of horses and riders as was proved over and over again today. But it was not our day to have to deal with that eventuality, it was our day to cheer and yell and tell all those people we are Canadians and we are here to show you how it’s done.
Needless to say the Canadians were cheering their hearts out and the rest of the World eventually joined in as the reality of what was happening sunk in. SIX….CLEARS…! The Germans who had dominated the dressage had a rough day. One team member fell and then an individual rider fell before they got a horse around. What a disappointment for the German team. Ingrid Klimke broke the bad karma with a lovely clear and of course Herr Jung was quite unbeatable when he finished the day on his dressage score of 33….eek!
I spent the day on Susie Tuckerman’s golf cart. Susie and I drove backwards and forwards to watch various members of the USA and Canadian teams, warm up then go out on course. I managed to get a photo of everybody and watched some of the fences on a huge tron TV screen near the coffin, fence seven. Because of limited access to Susie’s disabled person’s golf cart, we mainly watched at fences four, eight, nine and seven. I didn’t actually see any of the Canadians over fence eight which was a stinker of a corner. Several horses touched down on the top of it because of the width. Very few riders did the straight route at the third from last, the double of hedges angled over two wide ditches. Jessica Phoenix was one of those who took the risk and got it done – in very good company with Pippa Funnel.
The Italian horse who was hurt was a lovely horse. Susie and I had been watching him warm up while viewing Phillip for USA and Kyle for Canada in the warm up area. We both commented on what an exceptional jumper the horse was, however, today was not to be his day. The commentator was getting more and more Canadian friendly as the day wore on and finally commented that the Canadians were giving everyone a lesson on how cross country should be done.
Back at the barns Colombo had his feet iced off and on for most of the day. Then a team jog at nine pm tonight which he passed with flying colours. Another team jog at six am tomorrow (yes, I did say six…) followed by The Jog at nine am. This means the alarm will be going off at five am tomorrow and as a result this blog entry is a bit short and sweet. But ‘sweet’ it is, I was so proud to be Canadian today.
