The Canadian national anthem rang out for the second time in as many days in the International Arena at Wellington International during Week 3 of competition at the Winter Equestrian Festival (WEF). A 2016 Olympian for Canada, Amy Millar rode Christiano to the top of the leaderboard in the $62,500 Hermès CSI4* 1.50 Classic.

Fellow Canadian Peter Grant set the track and welcomed a field of 55 and a sizeable jump-off of 16. Millar put the seasoned Christiano, a 12-year-old Brandenburg gelding (Canoso x Compliment) owned by Future Adventures, to work over the tie-breaking course.

“It was a long way between the first two jumps and I went early,” said Millar, 46. “I was going to do nine which was going to be leaving out two strides from normal. I took off like that was the plan but it was not there. I did a really fast ten and I think if I had had time to watch a whole bunch of other people I probably just would have planned ten and that would have been way slower, but I was off. Same in the last line; it was either seven or eight but I was so short to the vertical that I was wide to the left and I ended up in the eight but it was still fast enough to get it done.”

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