Dressage-News

WELLINGTON, Florida, Feb. 12, 2021–Brittany Fraser-Beaulieu rode All In to a personal best score to win the Global Dressage Festival World Cup Grand Prix Friday and maintain their position as Canada’s top partnership campaigning for a place on the Olympic team.

Brittany and the 16-year-old KWPN gelding were awarded 73.696% to beat her coach, Ashley Holzer, a four-time Olympian for Canada who now rides for the United States who made her Big Tour debut on Valentine for 71.826% and second place. Canada’s Chris von Martels on Eclips was third on 70.326%, by far the pair’s best result in four CDI Grand Prix starts. (see separate story on Ashley Holzer and Valentine).

The 32-year-old Brittany, and mother of a 19-month-old boy, edged past the previous best result on All In of 73.674% set at this same Palm Beach International Equestrian Center a year ago despite a “Trauma Hawk” helicopter hovering a few hundred yards/meters away.

“I feel really relieved that we had such a good test,” she said. “To be honest, I think this was probably my best Grand Prix to date. He was really on the aids, totally focused.

“There was a Trauma Hawk circling above during our test and I was a little worried about that, but he stayed totally with me through the whole ride. It was really incredible.”

Brittany, whose has had All In since the horse was five and his first international competition was at Small Tour in Wellington in 2013 and has competed for Canada at the 2015 Pan American Games in Toronto and the 2018 World Equestrian Games in Tryon, North Carolina, was awarded a mark of 10 from one judge for the rein back, and a pair of nines for the entry and halt and another nine on the final halt.

She explained that cutting the warm up time to 15 minutes because All In is so big and gets tired easily was working.

He had a light season in Canada during summer when most shows were suspended as “I need to preserve him.” She brought All In back to Wellington to work with Ashley in November. After a competition in January, they worked on piaffe and passage.

“We worked on going error free,” she said, “and that’s hard to do on a big horse with so much power, but he can really collect his gait easily, so we were just working on the simple things–square halts, halt-rein-back, stuff that I know I lose a few points on.”

With the international competition schedule uncertain, she opted to seek one of the two starting places set aside for North America at the World Cup Final in Gothenburg, Sweden in April as well as continuing to prepare for the Olympics still set for the end of July.

The rides Friday by Brittany and Chris von Martels means that three combinations so far this year have Grand Prix scores of at least 70% in seeking to qualify for one of three places plus a reserve on Canada’s team for the Olympics–Lindsay Kellock on Sebastien scored 72.326%, a career high Grand Prix result Thursday.

Results:

CDI-W Grand Prix