Dressage-News

TEMECULA, California, April 12, 2019–California’s Sarah Lockman and First Apple became the leading Small Tour partnership in the Americas by winning the West Coast Dressage Festival CDI1* Intermediate 1 Friday after only two international events.

The score of 75.765% for Sarah and the nine-year-old KWPN stallion was the highest at Int. 1 in the Americas this year with just over three months to go to the Pan American Games that Sarah is aiming for as her first Dutta Corp. United States team.

The Int. 1 score came a day after 74.835% in the Prix St. Georges Thursday, the highest in the U.S. since Jan. 1 but eclipsed by Tina Irwin on Laurencio that is the leading combination for Canada in rankings for the Pan Ams scheduled for Lima, Peru at the end of July.

The results from this event boosted the average of the required qualifying scores at Prix St. Georges and Int. to 74.779 with Ashley Holzer of Wellington, Florida and Valentine standing second on 73.564.

Sarah, 30, of Murrieta will be a rookie if she and First Apple are selected for the USA squad of mixed big and small your combinations that is looking to extend its gold medal performance to six straight Pan Ams staged once every four years. Two team berths are available at Lima for the 2020 Olympics, but the U.S. has already earned its ticket to Tokyo with the team silver at last year’s World Equestrian Games.

First Apple was acquired by sponsor Gerry Ibanez from Carolyn de Roo–Kooiman’s President Stables in the Netherlands last fall.

First Apple (Vivaldi x T.C.N. Partout) was competed as a seven-year-old by Dutch team rider Patrik van der Meer, including the World Young Horse Championships in Ermelo where they placed second in the preliminary and fourth in the final. In nine Small Tour starts in Europe over six months to mid-2018, Patrik and First Apple always placed in the top three, including three victories.

Sarah and First Apple worked with Patrik in Holland for a month before moving to Wellington for coaching with Scott Hassler who has been in California for the two CDIs.

Three-time U.S. Olympian Günter Seidel of Cardiff, California on Beltano, a 10-year-old Hanoverian gelding, was second in the Int. 1 on 72.294%, a personal best in three events this year.

Nicholla Clarke of on Coral Reef ScoobiDoo was third on 69.088%