GENEVA, Switzerland--Scott Brash of Great Britain just won over Kent Fsrriington by a tenth of a second in a thrilling Rolex Top 10 Final on Friday, Dec. 12.
Kent Farrington on Tulayna at Thermal on his way to becoming World number one (Photo by High Desert Sport Photo)Brash on Hello Chadora Lady finished clean in both rounds and finished on 45.63 to win over Farrington on Toulayna, clean in both rounds but in 45.79, while Richie Vogel on Cloudio was third with a total of four faults in 44.24.
"I'm absolutely delighted to win," said Brash, who had also won the Top 10 Final in 2014, "I'm delighted for my mare. She's such a quik mare,and she deserved it."
In a unique competition, the top 10 World Ranked Riders competed in a two round competition over two courses set by Gerard Lachat of Switzerland and Gregory Bobo of France.
In round one, riders went in reverse order of their world standing, and in round two went in reverse order of their finish in round one, with their aggregate score from the two rounds determining their finish, with their time in round tie breaking any ties.
FOUR WERE clean in round one, 10th ranked Steve Guerdat of Switzerland on Venard de Cerisy, fifth ranked Thomas Giles of Belgium of Qalista Dn, second ranked Brash and world number one Farrington.
Fourth ranked Christian Kukuk of Germany had a very surprising one time fault and ninth ranked Julien Epaillard of France on Donatello d'Auge. eighth ranked Daniel Coyle of Ireland on Incredible, seventh ranked Harrie Smolders of Netherlands on Monaco and Ben Maher of Great Britain on Dallas Vegas Batilly had four faults each.
In round two, a speed class against the clock, Kukuk had a rail down to end on five, Epaillard and Coyle had another four faults to end on eight, while Maher fell off after Dallas Vegas stopped following a too sharp turn to fence six to be eliminated,
Beginning his climb up the leaderboard, Vogel was clean in a time of 44.24, faster than Smolders, also clean, to both end on four faults.
Of the four clean in round one, Guerdat had eight faults in round two to ultimately finish ninth, and Thomas had four faults, to end on four faults, but in 44,48, slower than Vogel, to ultimately end fourth.
That left Brash and finally Farrington.
Brash and Hello Chandora had a missed communication going to fence four and Brash had to pull the mare around and just made the fence, but it looked like he lost time there.
He finished in 45.63.
“She is such a quick mare, she is so eager to get to the jumps and when I came around to fence four, she locked on to the double, which was my fault, because I should have anticipated that," said Brash. "For a minute, she thought she was going to the double and that just got a little bit untidy, that turn. She was amazing to jump the vertical and then the next line was a bit tricky because that was a bit messy, but she is so naturally fast and she jumped home good. I thought that Kent might nick me.
Last to go, Farrington slowed a bit before the second to last vertical, and then went a bit wide to the last fence to finish on 45.79.
"It was stupid riding," said Farrington, who had won the Top 10 Final twice before. "I needed do do one less to the last fence. The horse jumped to win and the rider rode to lose."
“I watched Scott’s round and my strategy was to try to go very smooth,” Farrington. “I thought I would catch him with my horse’s natural speed, while his horse is also naturally very fast. On the second to last fence, they were all having it down, so I took my time to make sure I cleared it and it swung me a little bit to the outside. I ended up on 10 strides to the last. I think the others went nine, so I lost by a fraction – so not a good strategy.”
“I’m more than proud of how incredible Cloudio jumped today,” Vogel said. “I think both rounds he could not have jumped any better. Unfortunately, I was not clean in the first round, so I was a bit disappointed after the first round, that I let him down there. I was thinking the three strides will be short for me, so I was sitting up after the oxer. I had quite a forward approach to the water oxer, and he was almost listening too well, he was really waiting, and all of the sudden the three strides got long, and got away from me, and he had no chance to clear that vertical. I am happy that I could ride him a little bit better in the second round and we luckily moved our way up a little bit.”
That rail in round one cost Vogel the win, as his final time of 44.49 was faster then either Brash or Farrington.
