‘He loves the mud’: new British name leads Pau five-star after climbing more than 20 places on soggy cross-country day

Britain’s Caroline Harris and D.Day have powered up the Pau Horse Trials leaderboard to head the provisional results after a sodden cross-country day (26 October).

Caroline and the super consistent 10-year-old arrived at the French five-star on the back of winning the CCI4*-S in the wet at Lignières. The gelding, owned by Lucy Matthews, Fiona Oliver, Marie Anne Richardson and Heather Royale, also performed well in the CCI4*-S at a damp Chatsworth in 2023, so Caroline knew he could cope with mud.

The preparation served them well and the pair gilded through Pau’s soupy conditions to climb from 22nd after dressage to hold the top spot ahead of the showjumping.

“He found it so easy, and he still had plenty of gallop at the end. I had no idea where we were on the time. I just kept galloping!” said Caroline, who added 10 cross-country time-penalties to her dressage score of 30.3.

“I didn’t know where the minute markers were, I just let him run and jump. He’s quite small and nippy, so he doesn’t struggle with the mud at all. He could have gone for two more minutes. He just kept galloping and jumping.”

The partnership have jumped double clear in all their international starts this season, including their five-star debut at Luhmühlen where they finished 12th. The Billy Mexico son is out of former racehorse Dillus (by Dillum) and that thoroughbred blood was an asset in today’s conditions.

“If I’m honest, I didn’t really want to run because I was a bit scared about the ground, but I know the horse loves the mud and ran very well in it at Lignières recently,” she added. “Some friends of mine gave me a kick up the arse to make me actually go and he was phenomenal, foot perfect from the start to finish.”

Cross-country day started soggy and got wetter. The Pau team pulled three obstacles last night, and another eight this morning. Loops were altered and sand poured onto take offs and landings. The course was shortened from 6,500m and an optimum time of 11min 25secs, to 5213m with a time of 9mins 09 secs.

On the whole, horses sloshed through. Yes it was challenging – but horses were finishing well. The overall picture was mud-splattered, without being attritional.

Overnight leaders Ros Canter and Izilot DHI, who won the 2023 event, were drawn towards the end of the day and now hold provisional second ahead of the final phase (40.6).

Ros had a beautiful ride this morning with her first horse, five-star debutant MHS Seventeen, with whom she holds 14th. She then showed the breadth of her horsemanship in adapting to the extra challenge of tackling such ground late on in the day with a masterful performance with Izilot.

“I definitely rode quite a lot wider on my lines to try and find him some fresh ground,” said Ros, who added 21.6 cross-country time-penalties to Izilot’s dressage score of 19.

“So Izilot probably covered a bit more distance than MHS Seventeen did this morning. It’s so wet that they are slopping through it, but I don’t think probably any of us would have ridden in conditions quite like this.

“Considering the conditions that the organisers have had to face, the ground has held up. It doesn’t look good, but the horses haven’t had a bad experience today.”

She added: “I felt that both my horses kept their ears pricked the whole way around today. Despite the challenging conditions, the mud was so wet that, although it slowed them down, I didn’t feel that it sucked them and delayed their jump or anything like that. So I think they came out having had a really positive experience.”

Tom McEwen was smiling through the rain after his cracking round with Brookfield Quality (“Norris”), riding off feeling as minute markers went out the window.

“I felt like a Pony Club kid back out hunting again – I was loving it, and so was Norris,” said Tom, who holds provisional third with the 15-year-old OBOS Quality 004 son.

“We came with Norris to be competitive and he’s been awesome. I couldn’t be happier.”

He added: “It was hard to gauge how it was riding because I went so early. But I was one of the few people that really did want to run this morning when it was still raining and you could hear it on the lorry roof.”

Tom thanked the Pau team for the efforts they put in to ensure the day could go ahead.

“People rode brilliantly so it’s been a great day for the sport, even though it’s rained more than England,” he said.

Little grey stallion Halo stepped up to join the five-star club, rising from 10th after dressage to fourth at this stage with rider Piggy March on a score of 45.

“I’m so proud of him. He’s 11, which isn’t that young, but he’s not done masses, and he’s certainly done nothing in the mud,” said Piggy.

Championships are a major focus for China’s Alex Hua Tian, which means that as important as five-stars are to him as a rider, they are not always on the plan. Pau is Alex’s first CCI5* since Badminton 2016 and his performance so far this week with Chicko has marked a happy return to this level.

“I have so much faith in this horse,” said Alex, who celebrated his birthday on Friday with a sub-30 dressage and now holds provisional fifth on 45.7.

“He’s so nifty in this phase – he’s so accurate and he loves his job. He’s not the rangiest of gallopers. He digs deep and he tries.

“We thought we’d be on top of the ground here at Pau and twisting in and out, and that’s not quite been the case today, but at the same time, it’s been a great challenge for him.

“It puts him, I hope, in a great place, to give his owners confidence to maybe do Badminton next spring.”

US rider Boyd Martin is in sixth (47.1) on his Paris 2024 Olympic ride Fedarman B. Austria’s Lea Siegl rounded off a tough 12 months on a positive note with her lovely jumping clear with DSP Fighting Line to sit seventh in the provisional standings (47.5).

Oliver Townend had three good rounds with his trio of Pau campaigners. Kentucky winner Cooley Rosalent heads his string in eighth. Sweden’s Frida Andersen and Box Leo bounded up the standings by virtue of their cross-country performance and are in ninth (49.5), while New Zealand’s Tim Price and the flash chesnut Jarillo complete an international top-10 (49.6).

The second horse inspection is set to take place at 11.45am local time (10.45am UK time) on Sunday (27 October), followed by the showjumping at 3pm local time (4pm UK time).

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