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Tim Price wins Pau five-star again on the same horse
· 2 min read
New Zealand's Tim Price won the Pau five-star eventing competition in France, which ended on 25 October, riding Jarillo on a score of 30.9 to take the title for the second year running. Britain's Bubby Upton was second on 32.9.
New Zealand's Tim Price won Les 5 Étoiles de Pau, the CCI5*-L eventing competition that ended in Pau, France, on 25 October, riding Jarillo. The pair finished on their dressage score of 30.9, adding no penalties in cross-country or show jumping. They were last year's winners and kept the title.
In eventing, one horse completes dressage, cross-country and show jumping in turn, penalties are added up, and the lowest score wins. Five-star is the sport's top level, and Pau was the last five-star event of the season.
A contest that went to the final round
Britain's Bubby Upton and Its Cooley Time were second on 32.9, and Tim Price's wife, Jonelle Price, was third with Senor Crocodillo on 34.6. The margin between first and second was two penalties.
Jarillo was second after dressage and moved into the lead with a fast clear cross-country round. In the final show jumping phase, his rivals jumped clear inside the time one after another, so a single fence down would have dropped him out of the top three. Jarillo hit an oxer (a spread fence with rails set in two rows) hard, but the rail settled back into its cups and stayed up. The top five after cross-country did not change, and 29 horses completed the event.
Two five-star wins on one horse, a first
"I'd never won a five-star on a horse twice," Price said afterwards. According to Horse & Hound, it was his seventh five-star win and his third at Pau. Jarillo, a 12-year-old gelding, had two fences down at Luhmühlen CCI4*-S in Germany this season, which drew attention to how he would jump on the final day.
The Prices brought six horses, all of which completed, and took five of the top ten places. Tim Price also finished fourth on Happy Boy, while Jonelle Price was eighth on Grappa Nera and ninth on Capitaine De Hus.
Second place is Bubby Upton's best result at five-star level. Last year she brought three horses to Pau and completed with none of them. Britain's Tom McEwen finished fifth on his dressage score of 36.6 with the nine-year-old Quintus, the pair's first five-star.