Jaclyn Duff Wins Spirit of the West Cup 1.45m

With just one day before the $132,000 Longines FEI World Cup™ Jumping Calgary presented by pandaHAUS, riders took the time for a little fun and some fast competition at Royal West.

The $35,000 Spirit of the West Cup 1.45m sponsored by GGT Footing and Scott Venturo LLP was contested on the longest course of the year as set by designer Werner Deeg. The Cup came down to a jump-off among nine horses, including three mounts from one rider— Vanessa Mannix— and two from another, Keean White.

The jump-off course had a little bit of everything to test the horses. In the end it was getting an elusive clear that propelled Jaclyn Duff on Pater Noster to first-place honours, navigating the course in 42.81. Coming off a fine summer in Europe Duff is thrilled to get a win in the Spirit of the West Cup ahead of the Longines on Saturday.

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“I targeted this class with Pater Noster, and it’s really gratifying to get a big win like this. This is a great show and it’s an honour to win here.” Duff was happy to have Pater Noster in the ring. “He’s a horse who, when he gets in the ring, he wants to win. He puts his heart into every single class. And he’s a great thrill to ride.”

Hera van der Kouterhoeve with Keean White aboard took second place in a tidy 45:25. Canadian Olympian Jill Henselwood directed Farfelu du Printemps to third place in 47.67— not bad for someone who wasn’t supposed to be here after hurting a knee this summer.

“I really wanted to come here,” she said. “They said you can’t go. You’re not ready. So I had to pay 75 percent of my expenses to get here. I felt like I got stronger and my horses got stronger as the week went on. If it’s not too hard on the horse I’ll be ready to ride on Saturday.”

In fourth place was Laura Jane Tidball with a clean ride on Prim’ de Lairaud. After that came riders with four faults. Vanessa Mannix on Winslow High was fifth while her second mount Nirvana de Terlong captured sixth.

Cynthia Keating of GGT footing sponsored the Spirit of the West and is pleased to see how well the surface is holding up. “Royal West president John Anderson does a fine job of mixing his own recipe for the surface. The riders are so happy to have a surface where they can land on and turn and hold up. We love working with him here and at Rocky Mountain Show Jumping.”

Earlier in the day the highlight was the $5,000 1.10m Costume Speed Derby New View Tack Shop as the riders channelled everyone from Donald Trump to Captain America to The Queen of Hearts. First place went to Harry Potter (Justine Tainsh) on Christina 14 in 59:95 seconds. In second was The Mad Hatter (Tiffany Sullivan) on Gladiator. Third was “Broken” (Stephanie Lapointe) on Sin City who knocked down a rail and still made the top three.

Best costume award was a tough one for judges who called it a tie between Tiffany Sullivan aboard Mad Hatter/ Rabbit and Misty Cassar as the Queen of Hearts/ Rabbit on Little Indian.

Results for all the classes on Friday can be found here.

The action winds up tomorrow, Oct. 29 with the $132,000 Longines FEI World Cup™ Jumping Calgary presented by pandaHAUS. The Longines FEI World Cup ™—boasting a minimum of $2.4 million prize money across the series— culminates in Omaha, Nebraska, from March 27 to April 2, 2017.

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