Fancy having a crack at the BE90 Mitsubishi Motors Cup next year? Here’s what the 2018 cross-country looked like

The BE90 Mitsubishi Motors Cup cross-country course at Badminton was 3,100m in length in 2018. The optimum time was six-minutes and 42 seconds, with horses riders required to travel at 450m/min, which 18 combinations from 107 starters achieved (16.8%). Sixty-five competitors managed a clear cross-country jumping round — 60.2% of starters.

Take a look around the course and find out which fences caught combinations out…

Fence 1

Fence 2 — one refusal

Fence 3 — three refusals

Fence 4

Fence 5 — 17 refusals

Fence 6 — three refusals

Fence 7AB — two refusals

Fence 8

Fence 9ABC — 19 refusals

Fence 10

Fence 11AB — one refusal and one fall

Fence 12

Fence 13 — 16 refusals

Fence 14

Fence 15ABC — three refusals

Fence 16AB — seven refusals

Fence 17

Fence 18AB — one refusal

Fence 19 — one fall

Fence 20

Fence 21 — three refusals

It was an agonising wait for BE90 Mitsubishi Motors Cup winner Lauren Burton who was second out on the BE90 cross-country course on Wednesday 2 May. She adding nothing to her dressage score of 30.1 penalties , but then had to wait until the end of the day to find out that the title was hers. The Mitsubishi Motors Cup debutant piloted Susan Allerton’s D Akieda to a fantastic double clear to secure the win by the narrowest of margins over second placed Robert Gilsenan who finished on a score of 30.3.

An overwhelmed Lauren said: “I came just hoping to get around. I was pleased with her test, she went well. It’s been a good experience!”

Frustratingly going two seconds too fast on the cross country cost Robert the win on the 10-year-old gelding Landis Rocket Man. Adding 0.8 penalties to his dressage score of 28.5 saw the partnership finish in second place. Robert praised his consistent horse, who has only once returned without a rosette from a BE event, claiming that “he always goes really well and never has a bad day.” He continued by saying he was “annoyed with himself, but top three is a really good achievement; [Landis Rocket Man] didn’t put a foot wrong.”

For all the latest news analysis, competition reports, interviews, features and much more, don’t miss Horse & Hound magazine, on sale every Thursday.

Our bumper 24-page Badminton report will be in our 10 May issue, including opinion from Oliver Townend, Mark Phillips and Peter Storr.

Gemma Redrup

H&H features, racing and point-to-point editor

Gemma is an experienced journalist, having been part of the H&H team since 2014, who is passionate about all equestrian sports, including racing and point-to-pointing. She has enjoyed riding out for top trainers Nicky Henderson and Charlie Appleby and took part in a charity Flat race at in August 2018. Gemma’s reporting talents have taken her to numerous five-star events around Britain and Europe, as well as European championships.