Earning a spot on a U.S. Equestrian Federation team through the selection trials process is all about consistency. And the three riders and their horses who ended up on top of the trials for the Olympic Games put consistency together with brilliant jumping to earn their trip to Athens.

Beezie Madden on Authentic, Peter Wylde on Fein Cera, and McLain Ward on Sapphire started out the trials at the top of the pecking order, and they never lost their footing.

The scores from six tough rounds, with no drop score, decided the results. Three rounds took place on the weekend of May 14-15 in Del Mar, Calif., and three more followed on May 22-23 at the Oaks Blenheim in San Juan Capistrano, Calif.

Said Wylde, who was the bronze medalist at the 2002 World Equestrian Games aboard Fein Cera, “What I’m most happy about is the great result that these trials have produced and the great team we have here.”

Madden, Wylde and Ward will join Chris Kappler, 37, and Royal Kaliber on the team. Kappler was awarded a spot on the team by the USEF Selection Committee-Chairman Ray Texel, Lisa Jacquin and Michael Endicott-before the trials because of their exceptional performances last year and early this spring.

“I think this is an incredibly strong team, one of our strongest teams in a long time,” Wylde added. “We have four great riders and four great horses, and that’s what it takes. I think this has all worked out, really, as well as we could hope.”

Madden agreed with Wylde’s enthusiasm. “It’s going to come down to who has a good day, as it always does, but I think we’ve got a great shot. I have a lot of confidence that we’ll get there all together and peak at the right time,” she said.

Madden and Authentic jumped four clean rounds and two four-fault rounds to finish with just 8 total faults to win the trials. Wylde was right behind her on Fein Cera with 4 faults in Round 1, clear goes in Rounds 2, 3, 4 and 5, and an eight-fault score in Round 6. Ward and Sapphire had clean trips in Rounds 1 and 2, 4 faults in Round 3, a single time fault in Round 4, and 5 faults each in Rounds 5 and 6 for a total of 15 faults.

“I think that the total number of faults we all had from throughout the trials is encouraging, too. I remember when we finished the trials for the WEG two years ago, with the same course designer and almost the same venues, and the best was 20,” said Madden. The top three scores from those trials were 20, 21 and 22 faults from six rounds.

Authentic Is The Real Deal

Madden, who rode Judgement on the 2002 WEG team, came into this year’s trials loaded for bear. “Other years, I’ve wondered ‘Who would ever have three [horses] that were good enough to go to the trials?’ ” she said. “But, this year, I ended up with three that I thought were really good enough.”

Of those three, Authentic, a 9-year-old Dutch Warmblood, proved the best. But Judgement also held his own, finishing sixth in the final standings. DeSilvio, another 9-year-old with a promising future, was in third place after Round 4, but Madden withdrew him when he developed soundness problems.

Authentic may be just 9, but Madden believes he’s ready for the challenge in Athens. “If I didn’t know him, I might have been surprised by how well he’s done, but he’s been amazing ever since we got him. He’s won at every level, and he just keeps doing what we ask him to do. He’s just one of those who tries to find a way to win instead of lose. He’s been a very game horse,” she said.

Madden, 41, and her husband, John, bought Authentic in the fall of his 6-year-old year, but they’d known him since he was 3 and in the barn of Johann Heins of the Netherlands, with whom they do a lot of business.

“We wanted him for a while, and actually a couple of students of ours tried him. He was a sensitive horse, and when he was young, he had a little bit of a funny style with his front end,” said Madden.

Authentic moved up to the grand prix level last year, and finished 2003 with wins on the European indoor circuit. He topped the Audi Grand Prix of Maastricht (the Netherlands) in December and the Mercedes German Masters Grand Prix at Stuttgart (Germany) in November. On the Florida circuit, he won the $25,000 WEF Challenge Cup Round 5 and then placed second in the $200,000 Budweiser American Invitational.

Authentic started off the trials with two clean rounds. But in Round 3, held under the lights in Del Mar, he put a foot in the water.

“It was kind of my fault,” said Madden. “I went by the far end of the ring, and a kid came running toward the rail, just as I went around the corner, and he really veered in on the turn. I had to get him back straight, and I never got going with enough pace. He jumped really high over it, and I could see his toes in front of me reaching for the tape, but he just barely caught it.”

Then, in Round 4, Authentic rolled the front rail of an oxer off the cups. “Maybe I was a little slow through the turn, but he jumped it great. It was just a little bit of show jumping luck,” Madden said.

But luck didn’t desert them again, and Madden and Authentic recorded the day’s only double-clean performance in Rounds 5 and 6, the last day.

Madden said that the long process helped educate Authentic. “It was a lot for a young horse. I was actually more worried about the trials than if I did make it to Athens,” she said.

“I think that, by the Olympics, he’ll be farther along and with more experience, having made it through the trials well,” she added. “I was a little nervous that this was early in his 9-year-old year, he’s got such a phenomenal temperament and is such a fighter. By the time we get to Athens, I have every reason to believe that he’s going to be just fine.”

Authentic (Guidam�”Gerlinda Star) isn’t a typical warmblood type. “He’s more like a Thoroughbred, which suits me very well. He’s really light off the ground, like a deer. He’s more of an energetic horse than he is hot,” said Madden.

They do make one concession to Authentic’s sensibilities, however. Only his forelock and the top six inches or so of his mane are braided. “He doesn’t like the mane to tickle his ears. He acted like something was in his ear a lot, and he hasn’t done it since we started braiding it,” Madden said. 

Much More Than “Fein”

Just as he did two years ago for the WEG trials, Wylde, 39, shipped Fein Cera from his base in the Netherlands for the trials. And they proved that they haven’t lost a bit of their form.

“Fein Cera is now as fresh and as good as she’s ever been,” said Wylde.

“Cera” finished last year by placing third in the FEI World Cup-qualifying grand prix in Geneva (Switzerland) and fifth in the World Cup class at Olympia (England) at the end of December.

“I made the conscious decision that I needed to give her a break and have her fresh for these trials. I had hoped to get a bye, but I knew I couldn’t plan on it, so I needed to plan to do them. So, after Olympia, I gave her a real break. She had three months of no shows at all. I wanted to do one big show as a test to see how she would handle it. In order to get ready for that, I did two classes at a small national show, I went to ‘s-Hertogenbosch [the Netherlands], where she jumped brilliantly.

“I knew then that I could bring her back after three months off and do one easy show and she’d be right back on form again. So I gave her another break, and the week before she came here, she went and did one easy small show, where she did a couple of rounds, and then she shipped here for the trials,” said Wylde. He added that the bay mare had jumped just six rounds before the trials.

But she didn’t start with a bang�”she lowered the first fence of Round 1, just tipping the top block off the wall. “I think we were just a bit asleep for some reason. It would be one thing if it had been the middle of the triple or something difficult, but having the lowest fence on the first course down really makes me want to scream. It was just a silly fault,” Wylde said that day.

They made no such mistakes again, however, and Cera jumped beautifully clear rounds in Rounds 2, 3, 4 and 5 to take the lead with just 4 faults going into the last round. But when Cera toed the top plank at fence 4 of Round 6, things got interesting. And when she had to reach for the back rail of the second element of the triple and had that down, too, the crowd caught their breath.

“My heart was racing for sure,” said Wylde.

“The plank was just her having a fault. It’s been a long six rounds, and it just happened. The rail in the triple was my fault. I went too slowly into the triple, and I’m a little bit disappointed with myself. I thought as I cleared C coming out of the triple, ‘This is not going the way you want it to go, and you need to get it back together again.’ And she’s a brilliant horse and did it.”

Sapphire Sparkled

Like Madden, Ward has a young horse with exceptional talent. Sapphire, also just 9, has been Ward’s Olympic hope since he bought her sight unseen from Francois Mathy last year. She started at the grand prix level in the summer of 2003 and concluded last year by winning the $45,258 Big Ben International Challenge at the Royal Winter Fair (Ont.).

“I’ve believed in her from day 1, and even when things haven’t gone perfectly, I’ve had faith in her. I think she really wants to be one of the best horses in the world. She has that kind of character. Her future is still ahead of her,” said Ward, 29.

“I think the experience in Europe will only help her more, and I believe this horse is a medal talent. There was some pressure today. I’ve had some disappointments in the past with near misses for the team, so, yes, I am definitely very excited to have made it,” he added.

Like Authentic, Sapphire quickly collected two clear rounds over Rounds 1 and 2. But in Round 3, she pushed out the front rail of an oxer, the A element of a combination out of the corner. “I over-rode it a bit. In [Round 2, jumped over the same course], she looked at that combination a bit and jumped really high over it. So, I pushed her at it a little this time when I should have just trusted her,” Ward said.

Over Round 4, a massive course, Sapphire jumped foot-perfect, but Ward’s careful riding brought them in just over the time allowed, and they picked up a time fault. “My horse is a little bit of a slow horse; she almost looks like she’s going in slow motion, so the time allowed is certainly a concern,” said Ward. “I made a conscious decision before I went into the ring that I was going to be aware of the time, but I was going to jump the fences first and worry about the time second.”

In Rounds 5 and 6, Sapphire and Ward picked up a rail and a time fault in each.

“She learned a tremendous amount throughout the trials, but it was more about what we learned about each other-hat we can tackle these kinds of courses, that we can jump these big combinations. Today, I added a stride to the triple, which is something I’ve never really done with her before, and she did it beautifully. You learn so much about your horse and your horse learns what they can do.”

Learning Experiences

Alison Firestone, 28, and Casanova jumped their way into fourth place, earning them the alternate berth for the team. They followed up a clear first round with a single rail down in each of the other five rounds.

“I felt like we were really consistent; it was just that in a couple of rounds we had some really unlucky rails,” said Firestone. “I had the last jump down a couple of times, and then on the last course, which was so tough, I had the second fence down, and I think that was probably the easiest jump on the course. But that’s show jumping.”

And now she’s looking forward to showing with the team at Aachen on July 14-18. “I really couldn’t be happier with how things went. I feel like I went and did what I set out to do and did it well. It would have been nicer if a couple more rails had stayed in the cups, but that’s how things go sometimes,” she said.

Lauren Hough, 27, just missed repeating her 2000 Olympic team appearance, finishing sixth. She and Clasiko looked poised to be contenders, sitting fifth after Round 4 with 9 faults, but eight-fault scores in the final two rounds dropped them out of contention.

Clasiko had been battling a respiratory infection throughout the two weeks, and Hough thought it caught up to him. “In the second round, he just ran out of gas,” she said.

Clare Bronfman jumped her way to just 4 total time faults over the first three rounds on Irco Sun, putting her in a four-way tie for second going into Round 4.

“To be among the top 20 riders in this country is a true honor. Every day is a new day, and I’m having a blast. I’ve never had as much fun as I’m having right now,” she said at that point.

But the next three rounds weren’t as successful. With double-digit scores in each round, she dropped far down the list, finishing 21st.

The final two rounds were also the undoing of Nicole Simpson and El Campeon’s So Long. With 10 faults after the first four rounds, she was within striking distance of a team spot. But El Campeon’s So Long brought two rails down in Round 5, and collected 16 faults in Round 6 to finish tied for ninth.