Tremaine Cooper’s championship two-star course truly separated the professionals from the wannabes today at the Radnor CCI** on Oct. 14, but Phillip Dutton skipped around the course with his signature style aboard Lucky Stripe to land in first place at the end of the day.

“He jumped well,” said Dutton of the 11-year-old Thoroughbred gelding who once belonged to Cindy Burge.  “He’s at the end of his two-star career, I hope.  He’s done a couple.  I was pleased today because he kept his focus.”

Dutton had some difficulties with Lucky Stripe earlier in the year because he was getting very strong on cross-country. 

And the two-star course required an obedient and accurate horse.  Thirteen riders completed with stops and 14 more either retired or were eliminated of the 48 who started on course.

Donna Smith moved up to second place with her clean run aboard Rocket.  “It was a lot of riding,” she said of the course.  “It was tough, a real accuracy test.”

She pointed out that it seemed that if the horses kept running and jumping they finished great, but once they’d had a stop, more usually followed.

“I was 1 second over time,” said Smith.  “The time was good, very doable.  He started off strong, and in the middle of the course I backed off because he seemed to want to look around and take it all in.  Then we finished strong.” 

Will Coleman, 23, also moved up after his textbook cross-country ride aboard Kiki du Manoir.  “In the beginning he was a little green,” said Coleman.  “This is only his fourth intermediate.  But I was pretty aggressive out of the box and after the first three to four minutes he felt like a real two-star horse.”

Coming out strong was clearly necessary as 13 horses had trouble at the first major combination on the course, fences 5ABC.    This was the fox drop, where horses jumped over a realistic fox and then down a steep bank to a skinny.  Each element of the fence caused trouble, but the most run-outs came at fence C. 

“It looked like people trusted their horses too much to jump down the bank,” said Coleman.  He explained that many horses stopped or hesitated coming down the bank and that made the distance to the narrow much more difficult.

Kyle Carter’s horse, Gibson, sustained the only major injury of the day at fence 5C when he jumped it badly, hit his stifle and possibly injured his tendon.  The course was held for 45 minutes while Gibson’s leg was stabilized, and then he was transported to the New Bolton veterinary hospital. 

Wendy Lewis and Galway Blazer had their first run-out at fence 5C before retiring after two stops at fence 7ABC.  Stephanie Baer retired Letida at fence 5, and Rebecca Ferber was eliminated there after a stop at each element with As You Wish.

Other bogey fences included fence 7ABC where dressage leader John Williams and Sweepea Dean met their Waterloo. The first element was a gait, then three strides to a corner and then a right turning three strides to a table.  Williams tried to squeeze four strides in before the table, and Sweepea Dean came up under the fence causing Williams to somersault over his head.  Both horse and rider were fine, but after remounting and jumping the table, Williams opted to retire.

Karl Slezak also retired Showdown at fence 7 after a stop at fence 5 as well, but he rode into seventh place with his second ride, Rather Well.  Kim Severson retired Tipperary Liadhnan when he stopped at fence 7 and then stopped again at fence 9, but she sits in fourth with Tsunami and ninth with Choo Choo Mcgoo.

The offset tables at fences 23 and 24AB also caught many riders out.  Dutton thought it was a good accuracy question.  “Before you move up to the three-star level you need to be able to place your horse with enough energy,” he said.  The maximum height tables also tested scope according to Dutton.

Emily Beshear picked up 20 penalties at the tables with Woodburn, as did Darrah Alexander with Law and Order and Phyllis Dawson and Viatar.

Despite the many issues on course, there were hardly any falls.  “I don’t think the horses came out of it badly,” said Dutton.  “The trouble was in accuracy and disobedience, not zapping the horses’ confidence.  I think it was a well-designed course.”