WELLINGTON, Fla.--Rising German star Felicitas Hendricks on Drombusch OLD won the FEI World Cup Grand Prix Freestyle during the first Friday Night Stars evening of musical freestyle competition at the Global Dressage Festival.
Felicitas Hendricks on Drombusch OLD in the Freestyle (Photo by Susan Stickle)Hendricks and the 13-year-old Drombusch OLD received the pair’s second highest score to date.
“This is huge for me because I did my first senior classes here last year and I never thought that I would be here in this position today,” said Hendricks, who has been a regular at the Festival since her debut season as a junior in 2015. “I was just happy if we got through the grand prix and now I’ve won this class. It’s unreal.”
Her test included double pirouettes, changes on a curve and down the centerline, piaffe fans and passage half-pass, carrying a challenging degree of difficulty score of 9.7.
Anna Marek on the 14-year-old Fayvel placed second, setting a new career high of 77.715%, far exceeding their previous best of 75.235%, set in Ocala in December.
Kevin Kohmann was third on Dünensee with 76.305%.
Many of the highest scoring freestyles featured big, modern beats and powerful lyrics.
FRESH FROM her team and individual gold medals at the under-25 European Championships, Hendricks put on a masterfully mature display with Drombusch, her partner of seven years.
“It felt awesome,” said Hendricks, who trains with her uncle Christoph Koschel, from whom she bought the horse. “Drombusch was on fire but 100% with me and 100% focused. I think that’s kind of rare. Sometimes when horses are so electric they start looking at stuff and being not 100% concentrated, but he was really trying his heart out.
“I wanted the music to be fun because he’s a fun horse, to be around and to ride,” said Hendricks. “I bought him when he was 6. Christoph told me this was going to be the right horse for me. That’s why I know him so very well, and he knows me, so that helps a lot, for sure.”
Marek picked up 20 valuable points towards qualification for the 2024 World Cup Final, April 16–20 in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia, on her new ride, Fayvel.
This was just the pair’s third CDI show together.
The horse was formerly competed at the level by his adult amateur owner Cynthia Davila, but when she was injured Marek took over the reins.
It went so well that Davila and Marek’s coach Ann Gibbons suggested she keep the ride for the year.
“Anne said that if we were going to really do the senior Grand Prix, we’d need a harder freestyle,” said Marek, who is based near Ocala. “We worked with Karen Robinson and I told her that the horse is so handy he can do some really cool stuff. So we put together this really complicated freestyle and it’s like a walk in the park for him. He’s like a little bouncy ball, he doesn’t even think it’s hard."
“I had no idea what to expect,” said Marek of Fayvel’s ‘Friday Night Stars’ performance. “He went under the lights in Ocala, but the atmosphere is way quieter up there, so I didn’t know how he’d handle it, but it was so much fun.”
Another rider coming fresh from high-scoring performances in Ocala and handling the electric atmosphere in the Festival’s stadium arena was Kevin Kohmann, who also trains with the horse’s former rider, Christoph Koschel.
“It’s way more quiet up there; the energy here, I hadn’t experienced it with my horse like this,” he said. “I actually really loved it, and next time I’ll know what to expect. Dünensee was awesome, what a cool guy.”
Kohmann knew the horse as a 5-year-old, when he could already do tempi changes, but he then went to Europe and the pair only relinked much later, making their CDI debut a year ago.
