WELLINGTON, Fla.--Geñay Vaughn on Gino won the CDI4* Grand Prix, and Ashley Holzer on Hawtins San Floriana.won the CDI3* Grand Prix at the Global Dressage Festival on Thursday, Jan. 5.
Genay Vaughn on Gina (Photo by Centre Line Media)A total of 27 grand prix riders competed on opening day of week five at the Festival in the day’s two top level classes, while unusually chilly and blustery conditions allowed a single plus-70% score to be enough to claim the honors in each class.
In the CDI4* class, Vaughn won on 70.283 with Devon Kane on Vamos second on 68.717%, their highest score in this test in their three years at the CDI level, and Katherine Bateson Chandler on Haute Couture third with 68.391%.
Vaughn is based in Elk Grove, Calif., and she and the 15-year-old Gino are familiar faces in the winner’s circle on the West Coast, but this was their first East Coast victory.
“It was wild winter in there!” said Vaughn, who is spending the season in Wellington to try to secure a starting spot at the FEI World Cup Final in Fort Worth, Texas, in April. “For him to stay with me like he did shows me that he’s in tune with me. He’s the greatest. He’s a super freak with strengths in the piaffe, passage, and changes, everywhere really. His gaits are incredible, and everything keeps getting better; we’re starting to tap into showing everyone what we can do at home.”
VAUGHN has been riding the striking black 17.3hh gelding since he was 6, though he was originally intended as a ride for her mother Michele, who now trains the pair.
Ashley Holzer on Hawtins San Floriana (Photo by Centre Line Media)“When we brought Gino home, I did the first ride on him and my mom saw the potential and realized right away how special he was,” said Vaughn, who sits 36th on the FEI Dressage World Ranking. “With my aspirations and what I wanted to do, I’m forever grateful to her."
“Gino is a big boy, but that doesn’t matter much because he’s so in sync with me,” she said. “Today, he stayed listening to me and was so sensitive. I don’t think his size matters; it’s about the size of our heart.”
A field of 17 competed in the CDI3* Grand Prix.
Four-time Olympian Ashley Holzer on Hawtins San Floriana scored their first plus-70% performance to win.
Spain’s Pablo Gómez Molina on Ulises De Ymas scored 67.848% to hold off a challenge from Christian Simonson.
Simonson finished just 0.043 percentage points behind him with 67.805% on Fleau De Baian, a full-brother to the Olympic silver medalist Jerich Parzival.
The only blip in Holzer’s otherwise fluid test was a miss early in the two-time changes, but she was able to pick them back up.
She attributed San Floriana’s unflappable attitude in the adverse conditions to previous owners Carl Hester and Charlotte Dujardin incorporating twice-weekly hacking in all weathers into the mare’s training.
“I’ve had her about two years, and it’s taken a while to really get a partnership,” said Holzer, who formerly rode for her native Canada and switched to the U.S.A. in 2017. “Now, when she makes a mistake, I rebalance her and she stays with me, which was a huge problem before as she’d get really tense. It’s amazing to feel our partnership finally coming together. She’s so powerful, and Carl and Charlotte did a beautiful job training her."
“It’s fun doing this, almost more fun when you’ve had challenges and you’re able to surmount them. That was very exciting for me today,” said Holzer, who trains with Bateson Chandler with additional help from her goddaughter, Canadian Olympian Lindsay Kellock. “I really want to keep having a good time showing and competing, and I’m lucky that at my age [62] I get to keep doing this. I think the key is having a great team around you and seeking out constructive criticism.”
