A fabulous weekend of competition was had at the Bicton Arena Horse Trials (1) this weekend (22-24 April) set in the stunning grade one listed parkland at Bicton Park, Devon, owned by Lord and Lady Clinton.
Selina Milnes and Iron IV took the honours in the Rathbones Advanced Intermediate following an influential showjumping phase, finishing on a score of 37.6, “We could really see that the Bicton team had put in a lot of effort with the ground and the fences were dressed well. Bentley (Iron IV) was full of it, he ate up the cross country course and was really open and forward. It was a great final prep run before Badminton next week,” said Selina about the 13-year-old gelding owned by Mr William Rucker.
It was a successful weekend for the Bristol based event rider who also came second in the Symonds & Sampson Open Intermediate Section G on Cooley Snapchat followed by another second in the NAF BE100 Section N on six-year-old Cooley Capri.
Former British and European U21 Champion Phoebe Locke had a double of wins at the weekend firstly with MGH Oat Cake owned by Thomas Vicary, a 28.5 double clear put them in the top spot of the PKF Novice Section B. “I’m so happy with this horse, he really showed the class I know he has, it’s only our third event together and it was fantastic to have his owners there to watch him,” said the Royal Wootton Bassett based young event rider.
Her second win of the weekend was with her own 19-year-old Pica D’Or winning the Symonds & Sampson Open Intermediate, leading from the start with a dressage score of 27.3. Phoebe commented, “Pic really is the most incredible horse ever, he is out of this world and still keeps me on my toes all day, I’m so proud of him.”
Event Director and Bicton Arena Manager Andrew Fell, added “What a weekend of competition we have had at Bicton, the team did an amazing job and worked so hard to make sure the ground was perfect – we put a quarter of a million litres of water down on Thursday. We were pleased to see our hard work had paid off as we watched some fantastic cross country rounds including the likes of Olympics gold medalists Laura Collett and Tom McEwen on their Badminton hopefuls, London 52 and Toledo De Kerser. We look forward to seeing you all again at our next British Eventing competition 30 -31st July.”
Full results can be found here.
Images thanks to Jayphotos