All horses have successfully passed the first horse inspection at the European Eventing Championships in Strzegom, Poland this afternoon (Wednesday, 16 August).
All six British horses — Allstar B (Ros Canter), Billy The Red (Tina Cook), Bulana (Nicola Wilson), Cooley SRS (Oliver Townend, below), Quarrycrest Echo (Piggy French) and Quicklook V (Gemma Tattersall) — looked in great form.
The ground jury, Ernst Topp, Slawomir Pietrzak and Britain’s Sue Baxter, inspected 77 horses in total and all were passed.
Two horses were sent to the holding box but both were accepted on re-inspection. These were Spain’s Nereo CP with rider Albert Hermoso Farras and Arianna Schivo’s Quefira de l’Ormeau, for Italy.
Day one of dressage kicks off tomorrow (Thursday) morning at 11am local time (10am BST). The British team is the third nation to go, with Piggy (below) and Gemma riding as individuals.
Although the trot-up has less of a fashion focus compared to non-championship events due to nations presenting horses in team uniform, there were still several riders who stood out.
The first Austrian rider forward, Katrin Khoddam-Hazrati with Cosma, sported lederhosen, while her compatriot Margit Appelt, presenting Space Jet, turned heads in a dirndl, the traditional Austrian dress (below).
Their chef d’equipe, Thomas Tesch, was also dressed in lederhosen (below).
Another chef d’equipe proudly sporting his country’s colours was Italy’s Giacomo Della Chiesa, whose trainers were green, white and red.
Continued below…
More eventing news:
Walk the Europeans cross-country course in pictures
How to watch Strzegom European Eventing Championships on TV
Jonty Evans to miss European Championships with his crowd-funded eventing star
Ingrid Klimke, trotting up Horseware Hale Bob, added a dash of colour to her German uniform with yellow, red and black tassels on the side of her knee-high boots (below). Sweden’s Sara Algotsson-Ostholt also had similar tassels in her own country’s flag colours, blue and yellow.
Come back to horseandhound.co.uk later today to find out the full drawn order. Don’t miss the full Europeans report in next week’s issue of Horse & Hound, on sale Thursday 24 August.
