Canada’s Karen Pavicic To Compete Don Daiquiri in Europe in Last Ditch Effort to Qualify for Olympic StartLs
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June 23, 2016
By KENNETH J. BRADDICK
Karen Pavici is taking her Don Daiquiri to Europe in a last-ditch attempt to qualify for an Olympic start for Canada, the rider confirmed Thursday.
Karen who rode the 14-year-old Oldenburg gelding on the Canadian team at the 2014 World Games in Normandy has been accepted to compete at the CDI4* in Fritzens, Austria, a premier show staged by the Swarovski July 1-3, the last event anywhere in the world that could be used to qualify by the July 3 Equine Canada deadline.
Karen’s decision to go to Europe came after last week’s CDI3* in Cedar Valley, Ontario where Megan Lane and Caravella took over second place behind Belinda Trussell on Anton that secured the top spot with an average of 74.263 for the four best Grand Prix and Special scores from the start of this year.
The duo leave Friday for Luxembourg and are scheduled to be at the Alpine show next Wednesday, she told dressage-news.com after her entry was accepted by the show, formally titled the Manfred Swarovski Memorial Tournament in honor of the founder and is organized at Schindlhof by the Haim-Swarovski Family.
Karen, based in Surrey, British Columbia and Don Daiquiri had held the second spot after Langley, British Columbia CDI3* earlier this month.
With results through Cedar Valley, Megan and Caravella have an average score of 71.0875 while Karen and Don Daiquiri are on 71.039, just 0.0485 apart.
The Cedar Valley event that was organized as the last qualifier in North America for Canadian riders has raised questions beyond the country, over judging at the event that was upgraded to qualifying level and underwritten by the sponsors of Megan.
Fransen Iacobaues of Sweden at C had Megan at 68.800 per cent, the lowest score from the five-judge panel, while Elizabeth McMullen of Canada, president of the ground jury, awarded the pair 74.600 per cent.
Stephen Clarke, who was the foreign judge at the competition as well as being the FEI Judge General, said in response to questions from dressage-news.com:
“In accordance with FEI guidelines, an official meeting was held following the Grand Prix at Cedar Valley between the presiding members of the Ground Jury. Each of the scores for the movements within the tests were compared and thoroughly discussed with conclusions being reached.
“A summary of this meeting will be included within my ‘Foreign Judge’s Report’ which will be sent to FEI Headquarters as part of normal procedure.”
An FEI spokesperson said in response to questions from dressage-news.com, “We are waiting to receive the official reports from this event.”
The FEI has looked into the results of some competitions in Europe during this year’s intense Olympic qualifying. Also, the FEI has approved creation of a task force to study judging and recommend improvements but no appointments have yet been made.
The Equine Canada Olympic selection procedures are confidential and available only to declared combinations at a time when a key aspect of global dressage is transparency with the goal of making the sport understandable to casual spectators and not just the relatively small group of experts and at the same time diffusing its elitist status.
