TRAVERSE CITY, Mich.--Karl Cook on Kalinka van’t Zorgvliet,won the $31,020 American Gold Cup CSI5*-W Speed while Isabelle Ehman on Laganixx won the $31,020 American Gold Cup CSI2* Welcome on Thursday,, Sept. 17.
Karl Cook on Kalinka cant Zorgvliet (Photo by Natalie Suto)“I love riding that mare,” Cook said. “She’s just the best and it’s so much fun to go out there with her. It always helps to know the arena and the jumps but today was just having fun with Kalinka and following our walk and hoping all the jumps showed up on time.”
Cook finished clean in 58.76 seconds over the course set by Alan Wade.
“It went to plan,” Cook said. “There was one place where we could’ve left out one more stride I think but we just landed not in the place for that. Other than that it showed up the way we hoped and she was great.”
“You’re always trying to go fast – that’s the point – but the more you do it the more smooth it is and the less you’re doing something different,” he said.. “That’s just your base speed, which makes it easier. You don’t have to ride differently to shave a few more seconds off.”
Kelli Cruciotti VanderVeen on Mochito v/d Mishagen placed second in 60.09, and Erynn Ballard of Canada on L ‘Eperon-S was third.
EHMAN won the Welcome against some of the top riders in the world, including Mclain Ward, Christian Kukuk of Germany and Kent Farrington.
“Everything was a related distance so I wanted to make sure I stayed on the track,” Ehman said. “I had decent foot speed but I’m not on the fastest horse in the class so I absolutely had to stick with numbers that we walked. I had a rub at two and I got very lucky with that but she jumped great and she was with me everywhere.”
“I got to watch Mclain before I went in and I had an idea for what his plan was,” she said. “It’s great for me to learn by competing against these top riders in these two-star classes because you still get the competition that you’ll see in the future. It was good practice for me today to ride against top riders. It’s a good mix and gives me an idea of what to work on in the future.”
