Shawna kicked off the Wellington season with 5 wins last weekend (January 9-11) at the Wellington Classic Dressage Challenge I in West Palm Beach, FL.
This event was Shawna and Come On III’s second start at the Intermediare II and their first time with the new FEI Intermediare II tests. Shawna’s scores of 74.474% and 69.737% made for two wins. The event reinforced that Come On’s fundamentals are developing correctly and they are setting their sights on the Grand Prix.
This event was also a coming out party for Kathleen Broughan’s stallion Richman. This was only Richman’s second competition in the United States and his first in the big Wellington environment. Shawna scored 71.395% in the Fourth Level Test 1 and 72.927% in the Fourth Level Test 3 for two more wins.
Tonya Rowe’s Rigo also made a big impression at the event with a 70.930% in the Fourth Level Test 1 on the first day giving him second place behind Shawna and Richman. Rigo then won the Fourth Level 1 on Sunday with a 72.326%. This was an enormously successful step up for Rigo. It was his very first Fourth Level competition after only three Third Level rides in his career.
The whole competition validated all the hard work Shawna and the horses have put into competing at these new levels. Next on the schedule is the Gold Coast Opener in West Palm Beach, FL on January 23-25. This will be Come On III’s debut at Grand Prix! Rigo and Richman will compete at Fourth Level and start to seal their qualifications for the end of the year championships.
