Will Coleman Wins CCI4*-S Carolina International
The saying goes that things happen in threes, and Will Coleman certainly got a taste of this concept this weekend, completing a third consecutive win on a third different horse (Chin Tonic HS) in the Yanmar America CCI4*-S at the Setters’ Run Farm Carolina International. The pair’s finishing score of 19.4 marks a record for the lowest in the history of the CCI4*-S at Carolina International.
Saturday’s cross country course, designed by Great Britain’s Ian Stark, yielded just four clear rounds that were also inside the time. When Will Coleman left the box as the final competitor aboard Hyperion Stud’s Chin Tonic HS (Chin Champ - Wildera), he had just a tickle of breathing room after second-placed Liz Halliday-Sharp and Miks Master C came home with .8 time penalties. This gave Coleman three seconds of leeway on the clock – but he wouldn’t need it, stopping the clock bang on the optimum time of 6:33 and clinching the victory.
“I think the key to getting the time here is to be pretty efficient and quick in the beginning, because that's the most open part of the course,” Coleman said. “I thought Chin Tonic was great through that whole section. I think he just was very neat. It was kind of like wheels-up time for Chin, and he answered the bell. He was a really good boy, I think he tried really hard. I did press on him quite a bit there, but that I think is sort of the stage he's at in his career, he's ready to maybe have a little more pressure on.”
The 11-year-old Holsteiner gelding by Chin Champ was sourced in Germany by Hyperion Stud’s Vicky Castegren, and after being gelded he was sent to the United States as a five-year-old to join Coleman’s program. “He was a pretty stunning horse, even as a two-and-a-half-year-old. You watched him trot up, and you're just kind of drooling over him, even at that stage.”
“He was not really a galloping horse, he's more dressage and show jumping breeding so I think it's taken a while for him to develop a step on cross-country,” Coleman continued. “I still don't think he's the most natural galloper on cross-country, but he's improved tremendously and he does really enjoy it. I think his character in that regard is really what makes it possible for him to be a successful upper-level event horse.”
Coleman said Chin Tonic HS will aim for his debut at the CCI5* level at the upcoming Land Rover Kentucky Three-Day Event (Lexington, KY) in April, with one more to-be-decided prep run slotted in between now and then. “I think Kentucky will be a big question for him, but I feel like he's feeling more and more ready all the time.”
Second in the final order of the CCI4*-S are Liz Halliday-Sharp and Ocala Horse Properties’ and Deborah Palmer’s Miks Master C (Mighty Magic - Qui Luma CBF), who added just two seconds’ worth of time for a final score of 20.9. For Halliday-Sharp, her partnership with the 11-year-old Swedish Warmblood gelding – just under a year old at this point in time – is in the best place it’s been to date.
“He’s such a world class horse. I feel like we’re a real partnership now,” Halliday-Sharp said. “Some of the distances were challenging because they were quite short and he’s a big, bold, big-striding horse, but he was with me the whole way. I probably had a few more controls than I expected. It was a good thing — it was sort of my plan, but I probably over set him up in the odd place — which was where the 0.8 time penalties were.”
Halliday-Sharp will aim Miks Master C at the Land Rover Kentucky Three-Day Event, and praised Carolina International as an event she uses to ensure her horses are properly prepared.
Also collecting a hat trick of his own is Southern Pines-based Will Faudree, who finished third for the third consecutive year on his old friend, Pfun (Tadmus - Celerina), owned by Jennifer Mosing and Sterling Silver Stables. The 16-year-old Irish Sport Horse gelding showed his experience on cross country Saturday, skipping around to move up from fifth to clinch the final podium spot on a score of 30.1.
“He and I have such an amazing partnership — and it’s just fun, no pun intended,” Faudree commented. “He’s a horse I believed in from day one, and there’s no pressure on him now; I’m not going to do another five-star with him, because the distance is hard for him. I always joke that if Kentucky wanted to do a preview of how the combinations should be ridden, a monkey could take him through there; he just loves it, but if it’s over seven minutes, he gets a little tired, and it’s not fair to try to do that to him. Without the fitness and the pounding necessary for five-star, I can really focus on the finer details and things like the dressage.”