A major win has been a long time coming for the big gray mare and Chris Kappler.

After VDL Oranta rolled a rail off the cups at the end of the first-round course at the $200,000 Budweiser American Invitational, Chris Kappler figured his night was over. He returned to the stands in the Raymond James Stadium in Tampa, Fla., and sat down to watch the rest of the class.

But as horse after horse jumped without a clear round to be had the night of April 4, Kappler got a gleam in his eye.

“As there were eight or nine left to go, Chris came trotting down the steps and said to me ‘We’re jumping off!’” recalled Todd Minikus, who had also picked up 4 faults in the first round at the same jump on his Pavarotti. “I waited to see one or two more horses go, then I grabbed my hat and headed back to the barn. I think he had a feeling we’d be jumping off.”

VDL Oranta and Pavarotti were back in their stalls, munching hay. “The cell phones started lighting up. ‘Put the boots back on!’ ” Minikus said.

Jump off they did, after none of the 34 horses that started the class left all of the rails in the cups. It was the first time in the 37-year history of the class that no one jumped a clear first round.

Seven riders with 4 faults returned to jump again, and the jump-off had all of the drama and excitement that was missing from the first round. It turned into a real horse race, with Kappler coming out on top aboard VDL Oranta, just ahead of Minikus on Pavarotti.

A Snazzy Turn

“He smoked me,” Minikus said of Kappler’s jump-off round.

Kappler and Oranta shaved more than 2 seconds off Minikus’ time. Theirs were the only two clear rounds in the jump-off.

Minikus came back third in the jump-off order, after Jenna Thompson and Charlie Jayne had already accumulated jumping faults and time penalties. “My plan was to try and be clear,” Minikus said. “I have lost so many grand prix classes in my career by going too fast in the jump-off. You have to jump clear first then let the others take a crack at it.

“Chris did an unbelievable turn after the oxer-oxer combination. That was a snazzy turn, and that really won the class for him.”

Course designer Steve Stephens’ jump-off track included multiple sharp rollbacks, and riders could choose how much risk to take in the turns. Kappler went all out with Oranta. “I thought it was a good jump-off for me because there were more left turns. She goes faster to the left,” Kappler said.

“She’s got lots of jump, and she’s a big, strong horse. I really enjoy riding her,” he added. “This is my first big win with her. We’ve been in the ribbons in a lot of big classes, but the win hadn’t happened yet.”

Kappler couldn’t rest easy once he’d taken the lead, however. Last to go in the jump-off was McLain Ward on Sapphire.

Not Sapphire’s Night

The 2004 and 2008 Olympic team gold medalists, Ward and Sapphire, were three-for-three in big classes in March at the FTI Winter Equestrian Festival in Wellington, Fla. They won the $400,000 FTI Consulting Finale Grand Prix, the $200,000 WEF 9 Grand Prix CSI-W and the $150,000 WEF 8/CN Open Grand Prix.

In 2008 at the $200,000 Budweiser American Invitational, they delighted the crowd by jumping to a clear round in torrential rain and howling wind to win. As defending champions, they were crowd favorites. And since they went 32nd in the order with none clear in Round 1, the stage was set for them to win just by leaving all the rails up.

Sapphire jumped through a tough and scopey triple combination with ease, but she ticked the rail at another oxer with her toe, putting them on the list of four-faulters to jump off. “I think we were all sitting back, thinking that McLain was going to jump a clear round and win, and when he didn’t, we were all surprised,” said Cara Raether, who placed third.

In the jump-off, Ward rode an inside turn to 6AB, the oxer-oxer combination that had been the first two elements of the triple combination. The risk paid off with the fastest time of the night—43.20 seconds—but the back rails of both oxers fell. Their 8 faults put them fifth.

Raether, riding Ublesco, placed third with a quick 4 faults in the jump-off. “I’m just happy to have been able to jump off,” she said. “Ublesco isn’t normally the quickest, but like Chris, left turns are better for me, so it worked out. I just kept going.

“It’s been a bit of a dry spell for me lately, so it was a treat to jump off tonight against riders like Chris and Todd,” she continued. “There’s a long list of famous horses who have won this class, so to be in the top three is a big deal.”

A Bridesmaid No More

This might be the first headline win for VDL Oranta, a 13-year-old Dutch Warmblood, but she and Kappler have been picking up consistent checks in big classes for years. Kappler had seen Oranta (Indorado—Karanta, Nimmerdor) showing in Europe and liked her. Oranta, a product of the VDL Stud in the Netherlands, won the 2003 Dutch 7-year-old jumper championships.

“I’d been watching her, but it took a little while to get it to work out—to get the VDL Stud to want to sell her and for me to find some owners,” Kappler said.

But it all came together when the McArdle family purchased Oranta, and Kappler started showing her in August of 2005. “She’s always been solid and easy. She’s a pleasure. She’s strong and not the easiest ride, but whatever fence you point her at, she’s going to go. She’s a good, tough mare,” Kappler said.

They immediately hit it off, placing second to Rodrigo Pessoa and Baloubet du Rouet in the 2006 $200,000 Budweiser American Invitational. In the fall of 2006, they took second in the $150,000 Prudential Financial Grand Prix at the Hampton Classic (N.Y.) and the $100,000 Wachovia Securities American Gold Cup (Ohio).

But Oranta got hurt in the fall of ’06 and didn’t show again until October of 2007. That break put her and Kappler behind in their preparation for the 2008 Olympic Games selection trials. “She didn’t come back quite early enough. We had a couple of good rounds, but we were a little inconsistent at the water and it just didn’t work out,” Kappler said.

He consoled himself by picking up more good checks in 2008. They placed second in the $60,000 Spy Coast Farm Wellington Cup, third in the $200,000 CN Worldwide Grand Prix and sixth in the $200,000 Budweiser American Invitational on the Florida circuit. Later in the year, they took third in the $500,000 Grand Prix of Charlotte (N.C.) and fourth in the $200,000 FTI Grand Prix CSI-W at the Hampton Classic.

“I feel like she’s really developed this year,” Kappler said. “She’s just been on the up and up on this Florida circuit, and it culminated in this victory. It’s been a while since I had a big win, and the Invitational is my favorite class.”

Was It Too Hard?

Usually, when there are no clear rounds in a grand prix, the course designer comes under fire. But the top three riders in the $200,000 Budweiser American Invitational agreed that the track Steve Stephens built this year wasn’t unjumpable.

“It was kind of a weird class that four-faulters jumped off, but there was class horse after class horse in the jump-off,” Minikus said. “There have been some serious courses built for this class. I think it just played out weird tonight. For sure, there have been some bigger courses here, and some trickier. There have been some strange, difficult individual obstacles. It’s different every year and there are different horses in it every year.”

The triple combination at 6ABC was the real meat of the course, and many horses struggled through it. The A element was a 4’11” oxer with a width of 5’3”, with one long stride to a 4’11” square oxer with a width of 5’6”. Another long one stride led to a 5’2” vertical. The back rail of 6B took some serious abuse, falling 22 times in the course of the night. But horses such as Sapphire, VDL Oranta, Pavarotti, RMW New Day, Jeans Glove Varnel and Vancouver D’Auvray jumped through without a problem.

The last line also caught a number of riders. Stephens built a tight two-stride of liverpool fences at 13AB. Fence 13A was a 5’1” vertical set with a liverpool on the landing side, while 13B was a 4’11” oxer with a 5’6” spread over a liverpool. Riders then rode either a long five or short six strides to the Budweiser oxer, 5’ square and 5’6” wide. Chris Kappler, Minikus and James Billington had their only Round 1 faults at 13B.

“I think the important thing to understand is that Steve Stephens is an excellent course designer,” Kappler said. “He builds this class to a standard—he always builds what I think is an Olympic-caliber track.

“It proved to be a difficult course tonight, but nothing impossible,” Kappler continued. “The triple was a scopey combination and the last line coming home was tough. I was happy to see it. I feel like we’ve gotten so careful with short time  allowed that we’ve lost the art of simple big jumping. I think the pendulum has gone too far to the side of tight time allowed and racing over the jumps. I think we have to get back to jumping big jumps again. And I think tonight was big jumps. It’s got to be jumping contests, not speed contests.”