. Heartbreak for Tim Price at the Defender Burghley Horse Trials this morning after he finished just off the CCI5* podium in fourth place with Vitali.
The Kiwi combo had three rails down in the showjumping to finish on a final tally of 38.7 penalty points. It was a real roller coaster of an event for the world no.1, who with the 13-year-old Vitali set a new record in the dressage at Burghley with their 18.7, the first sub-20 score at the 5* event. They still led after the cross country and came into the showjumping arena with a rail in hand, but it wasn’t to be.
“It wasn’t the ending I was after but if someone had offered me a top five at the start of the week I would have been very happy to accept it, so you have to look at it that way,” said Tim. “There were some real highlights through the first two phases.”
It was a disappointed Tim who faced the media after his round. “The showjumping is his Achilles heel,” he said. “I was desperate for the worm to turn and for us to have our first really good result in the showjumping department.”
Instead, he said it was back to the drawing board to figure out the “funny little fish” of a horse Vitali was. Tim and Vitali were third at Burghley last year and Tim last won the CCI5* in 2018 aboard Ringwood Skyboy.
Team Price’s head girl Kerryn Edmands was the runner up in the Peden Bloodstock Horse Care Prize recognising grooms and all the hard work that goes on behind the scenes. It was Brit trifecta in the CCI5* with an emotional Oliver Townend and the 16-year-old Ballaghmor Class picking up the £110,000 winner’s booty on 33 penalty points – their second victory, having won Burghley in 2017, and a third victory for Oliver. David Doel aboard Galileo Nieuwmoed was second on 33.7, and Harry Mead on Cavalier Crystal third with a score of 37.4.
The 5* competition is one of just seven at this highest level in the world.
