Steve Guerdat; once again unbeatable at the Andalucía Sunshine Tour

The Swiss rider had his second big win today in the Small Grand Prix class with the super mare ‘Dynamix de Belheme’

Iván Serrano, wins the highly entertaining Suzuki Jump&Drive which inaugurated the new covered arena.

Vejer: Saturday 12th Feb, 2022. The Swiss anthem rang out across the lovely grass Hickstead arena here today at Montenmedio.  This time it was to celebrate a  prestigious win for Steve Guerdat in yet another of the most important Longines Ranking classes of the week.  After winning the Big Tour LR class yesterday, this amazingly talented rider, steered the lovely 9yr old mare  ‘Dynamix de Belheme’, to victory in this 1.45m jump off class.  ‘Dynamix de Belheme’ is by Snaike de Blondel, Dam Sire is the well known stallion, Cornet Obolensky.  Steve was the last to go in a jump off of 12 riders and just managed to shave off a few fractions of a second to beat the then, current leader, Austrian rider Max Kühner.  In the end Steve and ‘Dynamix de Belheme’, stopped the clock in 40.61s beating Max Kühner and his mare, ‘Vancouver Dreams’ into a well deserved second place with their time of 40.69s.  Third was the American rider,  Lucas Porter with the gelding ‘E Clinton’ (by Clinton) and fourth was another Swiss rider, Thibaut Keller with ‘Arley de Vayrie’.  In fifth it was lovely to see the Brazilian rider Yuri Mansur back here at the Tour with ‘Away Semilly’.

The Bulgarian rider Konstantin Van Damme won the Big Tour, 1.35m class today riding the ever successful ‘United’. Second was Dutch rider Doron Kuipers with ‘Just a moment Van T Heerenhuys’;  third was Italian rider Davide Kainich with ‘Arian’;  fourth was Danish rider, Clara Hallundbaek with ‘Abelone O. T. Lowlands Z’ and in fifth was another Italian rider, Michael Cristofoleti with ‘Nutcraker’.

Medium Tour results today: in the 1.40m, there was a win for another Dutch rider,  Leopold Van Asten with ‘VDL Groep Iron Z’;  Gregory Wathelet with ‘Sandero’ was second and Indian rider Maryk Sahney was third with ‘V.D. To Jo Pe Hoeve’.  In the 1.30m, Dutch rider Sanne Thijssen with ‘Huppeldepup’ was the winner with the British riders;  Tim Gredley with ‘Alicante Z’,  Jack Stirling with ‘Os Vino’;  Ashlee Harrison with ‘Astrid’s Lad’ and the Danish rider Rikke Haastrup with ‘Cavalino’ completing the results.

Spanish rider Carolina Villanueva Suárez with ‘Voice de Chenaie’, Julie Welles with ‘Jacquard’ and another Spanish rider,  Celia Cobo with ‘Alto du Roc’ were our winners in the Small Tour classes set at  1.45m, 1.35m & 1.30m,  respectively.

Competition continues tomorrow and is kindly sponsored by the Consejería de Turismo, Regeneración, Justicia y Administración Local de la Junta de Andalucía, through Turismo y Deporte de Andalucía. 

Tomorrow there are 12 classes throughout the day and one we are really looking forward to is the Horseware Grand Prix class, which will be the highlight of this first week here at the Andalucía Sunshine Tour.  In this class you can see some of the top horses and riders in the world jumping around a big track set at 1.55m.  We will also be celebrating the Grand Prix classes for both the Small Tour, at 1.45m and the Medium Tour at 1.50 m.

The Suzuki Jump&Drive

There was a great atmosphere here at Montenmedio today with many families and groups of friends enjoying the lovely sunny weather at the Tour, whilst watching top class jumping.  In all around 1,500 visitors came throughout the day and many stayed on to watch the Suzuki Jump&Drive class which really proved to be the most animated and fun event of the day.  This class was held to celebrate the inauguration of the new covered arena, the largest equestrian covered arena in the world.

The class was very entertaining with the riders being great sports and the audience really cheering them on enthusiastically.  In the end great fun was had by all.  To add to the celebratory air of the event free beer was on offer from Cervezas Victoria and it went down a treat with the crowd.

In the end and very fittingly, the Suzuki sponsored rider, Iván Serrano Sáez was our well deserved winner, he rode the first part of the 1.10m ‘course’ with great style on ‘Calanque de Riverland’.  His changeover to the car was as swift as the name of the car itself, the Suzuki Swift, a small, very manoeuvrable and nippy hybrid.  He then steered the car smartly through the obstacles at great velocity and ended up with a time of 71.83s.  With this he just beat the Italian rider, Alexa Larkin who was riding the wonderful ‘Lady Angeles’,  and who had clocked up a time of 72.51s.  Third was the Bulgarian rider Konstantin Van Damme with the lovely  ‘Larry 222’.  The trophies were handed out by the president of Suzuki,  Juan López Frade.