Nicholson Moves up the Board at Kentucky

Nicholson Moves up the Board at Kentucky

A beautiful clear cross country, inside the time allowed, has this morning moved defending Rolex Kentucky Three Day Event champ Andrew Nicholson up from 11th to seventh.

Nicholson and 14-year-old Avebury (owned by Mark and Rosemary Barlow and Nicholson) were one of just 19 combinations of the 55 starters to remain on their dressage mark.

“We were a bit casual at the first water (fence five), but we got it back on track after that,” said Nicholson. “I thought Avebury was very good.”

He felt the track had ridden well and was technically more difficult than last year.”

William Fox-Pitt (GBR) and Bay My Hero now leads the field on 44 penalty points, with overnight leader Alison Springer (United States) and Arthur slipping to 26th after picking up jump and time faults in the cross country.

All but one of the top 10 were clear and inside time, and of the 39 still in the field, 10 picked up jump faults. It seems the middle section of the course proved the most challenging.

Ten were eliminated, six retired and five withdrew before the cross country.

Sir Mark Todd and Oloa (owned by Di Brunsden, Peter Cattrell, Pip McCarroll and Todd) were one of those to withdraw.

Equestrian Sports New Zealand high performance coach Erik Duvander says the horse, who struggled in the dressage, would now probably be tilted towards Luhmuhlen, another of the top four star events.

For the full leaderboard from Kentucky, head to http://scoring.rk3de.org/leaderBoard.html .

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