US And Canadian Teams Face Off At Coupe des Ameriques
(Complete article taken from "The Chronicle of the Horse," August 9, 2002, pp.72-77; Article by Karen Briggs)

There was no overall winner at this first Coupe des Ameriques (rough translation: Championship of the Americas); it was just a friendly duel between nations during the CDI-W in Blainville, Que., on July 17-21. Two-member teams from the United States, Canada, Guatemala, Colombia, the Dominican Republic, Barbados and Argentina faced off at four FEI level in a residential area at the north end of sprawling Montreal.

As an FEI regional championship, the Coupe des Ameriques offered team and individual competition at the Grand Prix, Intermediaire I, young rider, and junior levels, as well as FEI Young Horse classes for 5- and 6-year olds and a first for North America - an FEI pony division.

Each country was invited to field up to three teams of paired riders, while some nations sent only individuals. Team medals were determined by the results of the two regular tests, and the individual medal standings were decided with the addition of musical freestyle scores.

In terms of medals, the Americans and Canadians duked it out from the beginning to end, each coming out nearly equal. (The US team earned 12 medals and the Canadian team earned 11, with the difference being a bronze medal.)

Canada scored the first victory in the Coupes des Ameriques junior competition when Amy McIlwham, 16, of Ottawa, teamed with her 11-year-old, Westphalian gelding, Favorit, for a 64.97 percent win.

The pair was part of the bronze-medal team at the inaugural North American Junior Dressage Championships last year, and at the Coupe des Ameriques they took home the junior team gold medal paired with Stephanie Chalaturnyk, 18, of King, Ont., riding Dunkaschon. McIlwham's overall results were good enough to easily earn her and Favorit the individual gold medal on Sunday with a combined score of 64.92 percent.

"I was feeling pretty good coming into this show, but I didn't expect to do this well!" said a poised McIlwham. "He was extremely good in the freestyle-he loves working to music. Any kind of music, get him really excited!

"He has the best personality; he always wants to get out there and work. I don't think he has a mean bone in his body," she added witht he obvious affection for her big gelding, who'd previously shown Intermediaire I level with trainer Ruth Koch.

The Americans claimed the silver medal, with Mary Claire Massey, on Scrabble, paired with Amand Garrett aboard Great Experience. Massey took the individual silver medal.

In the young riders division, American Jacqueline Paxton rode her 11-year-old, Olenburg mare, Sangmelima, to the winning score (65.12%) in the team class, in front of the panel of five international judges. Paxton, who celebrated her 21st birthday a week before the show, is a veteran of three North American Young Riders Championships, but has only been matched with this mare since March.

Tina Busse, of Breslau, Ont., was second with Amicelli, and American Lindsay Koffler and Alfredo took third.

Koffler, 18, Lexington, Ky., was just warming up. Although her partnership with Alfredo, an 11-year-old, Hanoverian gelding, is also a new one, she emerged victorious in the individual test, with second going to Sarah McIlwham (Amy's older sister), aboard Adagio, and third to Busse. Then, in the freestyle, Koffler teamed with Martin Kuhn, 20, of New Berlin, Ill., with Romulus, a 16-year-old Oldenburg by Ramiro, to dominate the competition. Their combined scores earned them the young riders overall gold medal.

Said Koffler, "This is a bit of a surprise, considering how worried I was in the warm-up! It's quite impressive going into that ring; it's a bit like Devon [Pa].

"Alfredo is very sweet but very sensitive-he tends to be the one in the barn who jumps at everything, so I try to be very steady for him," she added. " He was really nervous in the warm-up, but once he got into the ring, he was fine. And I managed to channel his energy; I was thrilled with his extensions."

For Kuhn, the Coupe des Ameriques has been something of a baptism by fire, considering that until this year, he'd never ridden above second level. "I only got Romulus in January, so it's been a learning curve," he said with a smile.

GRAND PRIX SCORES HELP CANADIANS PICK A TEAM

The large tour got under way on Thursday with the Coupe des Ameriques Grand Prix, won by Nancy MacLachlan and the chestnut Hanoverian Davis Cup. At 17, "Davey" can still be somewhat volatile in the ring, but he kept his cool under MacLachlan's tactful touch and turned in a score of 64.92 percent. It was enough to win the class over Toronto-based American Cherri Reiber with G Tudor (64.84%) and New York-based Canadian Ashley Holzer with the Hanoverian Stallion Imperioso (64.52%).

In Sunday's Grand Prix freestyle, MacLachlan and Davis Cup were once again the winners. "It pays to keep the same freestyle for years at a time," said MacLachlan. "He was wired today, but he heard his music and focused on the work. He really has been looking to me for support, finally."

Friday featured both the CDI-W Grand Prix and the Grand Prix Special for the Coupe des Ameriques. In the CDI, it was Neil Ishoy and the dramatic gray Andiamo Tyme, recovered from the injury that kept him from competing at the 2002 FEI World Cup Final, who won top honors, with a score of 67.10 percent.

Reiber and G Tudor once again were second (65.00%), while third went to Canada's 1999 Pan Am Games silver medalists, Shannon Oldham Dueck and Korona (64.40%).

In the Special, MacLachlan and Davis Cup demonstrated impressive consistency by winning again (66.08%), over US entry Pam Goodrich on Melville (65.64%) and Belinda Eames Trussell, of Stouffville, Ont., on Royan II (64.76%).

Saturday's events included the CDI-W Intermediaire I and Grand Prix Special, as well as the Coupe des Ameriques Intermediaire I and Grand Prix freestyles, held under the spotlights in the evening. The Special, which featured only two entries, went to Reiber and G Tudor, over Dr. Cesar Parra of Colombia, on Robinson.

But the Intermediaire I was hotly contested, with American Susan Dutta and West Side Lady-DC eventually scoring 69.85 percent to win the class. Canadian team veteran Cindy Ishoy was second with her promising young Proton, and Nancy Later finished third on Manster.

Dutta and West Side Lady also triumphed in Sunday's Intermediaire I freestyle, appropriately enough to a medley of tunes from the musical "West Side Story."

For Dutta, 33, who paired up with Later as the USA Liberty team to take the Intermediaire I team gold medal for the Coupe des Ameriques, traveling to Blainville felt like a return to her roots. In the 1980s, she trained as an event rider at the legendary Laframboises' Farm of the Mountain, not far away, and eventually rode at the North American Young Riders Championships in eventing in 1990. She made the switch to dressage in '91 and hasn't looked back.

Later was proud that her Manster, a Swedish Warmblood by Champan, showed such improved rideability at Blainville. "The atmosphere was a lot for my horse," she said. "He's 10, but he hasn't been around a lot. I overrode a couple of things that were unnecessary because he was right there for me. He looks so quiet in the barn-he's a little fatty-but he just lit up in the ring!"

Later hopes to take Manster, owned by Suzanne McCarthy of Bedford, NY, to Europe in the fall to train with US coach Klaus Balkenhol "and try to put it all together for Grand Prix."

Twelve entries danced into the electrically charged main ring that evening for the CDI-W Intermediaire I freestyle, but the winner, a unanimous choice among observers as well as the judges, was Jacqueline Brooks, of Holt, Ont., with the dark bay Oldenburg, Gran Gesto. Looking relaxed and expressive, their freestyle to Spanish-themed music belied the fact that the horse is only 7 and had never before done a freestyle in competition.

"Before last night, I believed he had a great mind for this sport. He's been such an easy horse to train-you ask questions and he gives straightforward answers. But until last night I hadn't ever tested him at a big show," said Brooks, 34. "This venue is a bit overwhelming, but he just went in and said, 'This is fine with me!' So it was fine with me too!"

She added, "Now I'll take him to as many qualifiers as I can and see if we can get him to the Pan Am Games next year. But whether we do or not, I have fun riding him every day. He's like a dog in a horse body."

The evening's climax, the CDI-W Grand Prix freestyle, featured only two entries, with Neil Ishoy and Andiamo Tyme a last minute scratch. But Dueck and Korona, 10, made thier moment in the spotlight count, with a freestyle that was as dynamic, correct, and thrilling as a freestyle can get. Exceptionally clean piaffes were a particular highlight as the pair performed to the classical strains of Vivaldi. Dueck is one of the few riders to use classical themes.

Said a beaming Dueck, "I was thrilled with him. It was so fun. He was right with me the whole time, even though that was the first time I'd ridden the whole freestyle-I only got the music a week ago.

"[Korona] is a very hot horse," she added, "but the hotter he gets, the more he focuses on me. It's all about if I can be there for him. I had comments from trainers, saying how classical his piaffe was, which is wonderful because until recently we were still shuffling."

Dueck had planned to head to Europe immediately after the Blainville show with her three horses. Now, she will have to make a detour to Spain in September, as she found out the evening of her freestyle victory that she'd been named to Canada's World Equestrian Games team, along with Holzer on Imperioso, MacLachlan on Davis Cup, and Neil Ishoy on Andiamo Tyme. Trussell on Royan II and Evi Strasser on Pryme Tyme are alternates.

Said MacLachlan, "To do well here and be named for the WEG team-this is the cream. It's been a long time coming!"

MacLachlan plans to retire Davey from Grand Prix competition after this trip to Spain, although her partner, FEI veterinarian Dr. Alan Young, is reputedly keen to take over the ride.

Kim Goodyear, chairman of the Canadian High Performance Committee, noted that because the Coupe des Ameriques was an international show, they felt it wasn't the appropriate venue to announce the selection of the WEG team. The riders were all informed individually on Saturday night following the freestyles.

SWEET SCORE

Lee Tubman, of Pefferlaw, Ont., was delighted to win the FEI young horse division for 5-year-olds with Marzipan, a promising Canadian-bred Hanoverian stallion by Mattgold, owned by Mike and Susan Nash of Hudson, Que.

"What was really nice was one of my judge's comments-that Marzipan was the type of horse they want to see in this class, namely one who's potentially of international caliber," he said. "It was also great to be able to show him in Quebec, where his owners could come and see him."

Tubman really likes the young horse division. "I enjoy these tests much more-the emphasis is on the horse, not the movements, which I think is a much better approach for a youngster. The scores in the first two categories are for suitability for dressage and quality of the gaits. There are enough of these classes offered now that I can concentrate on this division now and go on to the 6-year-old division next year," he said.

Tubman also showed wife Nancy McMahon's Davenport, by Davignon, to third place in the 5-year-old classes. "He's also very nice and very talented, but at this point less mature in his mind than Marzipan," he said.

And Tubman didn't stop there: He was also busy attending the judge's clinic held in conjunction with the show, as well as coaching. Student Michelle Degarie, aboard Figaro's Boy, a former mount of Sue Blinks', performed creditably in her first year in the young riders division, placing fourth overall.