New Zealand’s Wendi Williamson & Don Amour MH Capture World Cup Pacific League Title With Freestyle Victory at Boneo
5 years ago StraightArrow Comments Off on New Zealand’s Wendi Williamson & Don Amour MH Capture World Cup Pacific League Title With Freestyle Victory at Boneo
BONEO, Australia, Dec. 14, 2019–New Zealand’s Wendi Williamson on Don Amour MH won the World Cup Pacific League Final Saturday to earn an invitation to the global championship in Las Vegas next April. If she accepts, this will be the second World Cup Final in America for the pair that competed at Omaha in 2017 as the first New Zealander ever to go to the only annual dressage world championship.
Wendi and the 12-year-old Hanoverian gelding scored 72.300% for the victory to cap a campaign of three World Cup events in Australia this year to claim the single place available to the Pacific geographic to join the lineup of 18 in the Final. Australia’s Kristy Oatley, based in Germany, is competing in the Western European League as she has in previous years and performed at three World Cup Finals including the 2017 Omaha event.
Australia’s Fiona Selby rode Tacita to runnerup on 71.865%, a day after a personal best to post a clear win the Grand Prix.
Three of the five judges placed Fiona, 36, and the 16-year-old Warmblood mare first in the Freestyle, while one placed the duo second and another in third.
Wendi Williamson on the New Zealand-bred Don Amour MH set the highest international Grand Prix score by any horse in Australia in the Freestyle the next day.
Wendi’s campaign on Don Amour seeking a second World Cup appearance came after she and Dejavu MH, also bred in New Zealand, became the first New Zealand to win a World Cup start in 2017, but was eleminated in the Grand Prix at Omaha.
Paulina Carnovale on Captain Cooks scored 70.100% for third, the same placing as in the Grand Prix.
The league final drew only only five combinations as widespread fires further up Australia’s East Coast blanketed swaths of the country with dense smoke.
Results:
CDI-W World Cup League Final Grand Prix Freestyle
Judges: E-Clive Halsall-GBR H-Helen Hughes-Keen-NZL C-Mary Seefried-AUS M-Anne Prain-FRA B-Jane Ventura-AUS
| Horse | Rider (Nat.) | E % | H % | C % | M % | B % | Total % | Pl. | |
| Don Amour | Wendi Williamson (NZL) | 72.500% | 72.725% | 72.800% | 71.625% | 71.850% | 72.300% | 1. | |
| TACITA | Fiona Selby (AUS) | 72.750% | 71.950% | 73.100% | 68.625% | 72.900% | 71.865% | 2. | |
| Captain Cooks | Pauline Carnovale (AUS) | 70.000% | 71.225% | 69.300% | 70.375% | 69.600% | 70.100% | 3. | |
| DIAMOND STAR | Sally Rizzuto (AUS) | 69.125% | 70.050% | 68.375% | 69.750% | 70.975% | 69.655% | 4. | |
| Diva Royale | Holly Cutler (AUS) | 65.375% | 68.350% | 66.775% | 63.250% | 64.075% | 65.565% | 5. |
