Cool Mountain, medal-winning event horse
Vital stats: 11yo bay gelding
Breeding: By Primitive Rising, our of Ice Lolly (by Idiot’s Delight)
Bred by: Jane Pilkington. Half-brother to Ann Taylor’s four-star gelding Cracker Barrel
Owned by: the Hon Teresa Stopford-Sackville
Results: won 2007 novice championships, Ballygraffan CIC** 2008, Blair Castle CCI*** 2009, Rolex Kentucky CCI**** 2010, individual silver medal WEG 2010 (left)
View Cool Mountain’s complete eventing record
William Fox Pitt’s thoughts on Cool Mountain
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Cool Mountain couldn’t be more different from Tamarillo [on whom he won Badminton and Burghley and represented Britain at two World Equestrian Games and the Athens Olympics].
Their only similarity is that they are equally lazy, but apart from that, Cool Mountain is a very straightforward, genuine, generous horse. Tamarillo was also genuine and generous, but the qualities that made him so amazing were also his downfall.
Cool Mountain has an ability to rise to the occasion. He always does his best; he has never let me down and, although he doesn’t sometimes do it in the most classical way, he always wants to go between the flags. In the start box, when they count you down, if you don’t give him a kick he won’t move. That’s just how he’s always been.
Teresa Stopford-Sackville bought him as a yearling. Antoinette McKeowen had him as a four- and five-year-old and started eventing him. He was always competitive, but ‘Ants’ didn’t feel he was the right horse for her as he was quite lazy and backwards. I had Teresa’s other horse Silver Dollar, and between them they decided Cool Mountain needed a longer pair of legs and a bit of ‘waggoning’.
He’s always been very methodical and rather blended into the background. I never thought it was time to move him on, but equally I didn’t think of him as my next team horse. This time last year if you’d asked me, I’d have said he was a very genuine player, hopefully ready to stake his claim as a four-star horse. Now he’s one of my main contenders for the 2012 Olympics.
Cool Mountain videos
