Eventing Nation

1 week ago | eventingnation.com | Tilly Berendt

Very nearly one year ago to the day, Ros Canter rode into the main arena at the Longines Luhmühlen Horse Trials on her 2023 Pau champion Izilot DHI on as near to a sure thing as you can get.

1 week ago | eventingnation.com | Tilly Berendt

By on - Change is afoot in the top ten — and beyond — after the final horse inspection at the Longines Luhmühlen Horse Trials, held in front of the ground jury of Katrin Eichinger-Kniely, Merel Schurink, and Dr Ernst Topp. Four horses were sent to the holding box over the course of proceedings, and just one of those would go on to pass: that was a visibly relieved Declan Cullen of Ireland, whose splashy Seavaghan Ash had also been held at the first horse inspection.

1 week ago | eventingnation.com | Tilly Berendt

Woe betide anybody who continues to repeat the tired opinion that Luhmühlen is a ‘soft’ CCI5*. Dimensionally? No, it’s not maxed out. Length-wise? It’s unlikely you’ll ever see a nearly thirteen minute course here. Terrain? Pretty flat, actually. But it’s a course that’s greater than the sum of its parts: an academic, thinking rider’s track, with plenty of places to have drive-by and lots of places to lose valuable fistfuls of seconds.

2 weeks ago | eventingnation.com | Tilly Berendt

Tomorrow’s cross-country course at the Longines Luhmühlen CCI5* has got everyone talking, with several riders reckoning the 11:08 optimum time will be near-on impossible to catch, even with just 28 numbered fences — and that comes down to its intensity and technicality, “like an eleven-minute CCI4*-S,” as Ros Canter aptly put it earlier today.

2 weeks ago | eventingnation.com | Tilly Berendt

Yesterday’s first dressage day at the Longines Luhmühlen Horse Trials was notable mostly for its harsh judging, with nobody across either the CCI4*-S or the feature CCI5* breaking into the 20s (and plenty, to their dismay, flirting – or entering into a committed relationship with – the 40s).