As McLain Ward walked into the ring at Devon for the jump-off of the $75,000 Budweiser Grand Prix of Devon, he was taken a bit aback.  Course designer Olaf Petersen had opted to not remove a combination that wasn’t on the short course.  It was a decision that made an inside turn between the first two fences of the jump-off incredibly hard.

“That turn was shockingly difficult,” Ward said.  But he and the veteran Sapphire made the turn look quite easy, skimming the angle over the first oxer and landing and turning 180 degrees within a few strides to slice another angle to the next vertical.  That inside turn won the class for them, as Ward and Sapphire turned in a faultless jump-off in 40.08 seconds. 

They had been the first of five to go in the jump-off, and set a standard no-one else could match.  Laura Chapot made it clear she was going for the win when she cut the crucial inside turn with Little Big Man, but she paid for the seconds spared with a rail at the vertical that followed.  Another tight turn later in the course brought a stop, and Chapot and the crowd favorite “Pony” finished with 12 jumping faults and 4 time faults.

Margie Engle and the venerable Hidden Creek’s Perin, now 18, were the next to take a shot at Ward’s time.  Engle angled the first oxer, and completed the inside turn, but not smoothly.  They also had that vertical down.  They went on to jump the rest of the course clear, and finish with 4 faults in 43.09 seconds.  When Engle pulled up, she realized what had happened on the inside turn to almost put her into the standard of the jump they were turning inside of.

”He grabbed his left front when he landed off the oxer and tripped a little bit, and almost put me into the standard.  But he ripped half his foot off when he did that.  He was dead honest to even try and jump the second jump.  He’s a trier and he’s got a huge heart, and he kept trying to jump the jumps,” Engle said.  Perin’s game performance  put them into second.

Argentina’s Pato Muente challenged next, and with the compact and speedy As Di Villagana, he declined to attempt the difficult first inside turn.  Instead, he kept the foot-speed up and zipped around.  But his strategy backfired as As Di Villagana got a bit flat jumping into the B and C elements of the first round’s triple combination, and they had a rail there.  Their rail, plus 1 time fault for their 50.03-second time, put them into third.  Muente was thrilled with the finish behind the Olympic and World Championship veterans Ward and Engle.  “To be around all these guys is very special, and I’m very happy to be here,” he said.

The betting public wouldn’t have tipped the young Michael Morrissey, just 21, to threaten Ward’s lead, but from the time Morrissey cantered into the ring on Crelido, he looked on target.  He sliced the angle to the first fence and completed the inside turn smoothly and efficiently.  And as he serpentined back and forth between fences at the far end of the ring, the crown buzzed.  His speedy ride looked to be good enough to be in the ballpark of beating Ward.

But it was not to be.  In the turn out of the corner to the next-to-last fence, Morrissey lost impulsion and Crelido tried to stop.  They crashed through the fence, and Morrissey came off, eliminating them.

So, Ward led the victory gallop at Devon for his fifth time, in what was his 101st career grand prix win.  He won the class last year on a last-minute catch-ride.  “This is a special place for me,” he said.  “For some reason, things go well here.  There are certain places that are good to you, and that’s here for me.”

Ward hadn’t shown Sapphire since they finished tied for sixth as the top American finishers in the Rolex FEI World Cup Show Jumping Final (Nev.), April 18-20.  “The first jumped she jumped since the World Cup was in the schooling area tonight,” Ward said.  He was looking to give Sapphire a good warm-up class before they travel to Europe to represent the U.S. in the Samsung Super League Nations Cup in Rotterdam (the Netherlands) in three weeks.