British students celebrate double gold
British student riders have celebrated the start of the 2015 university equestrian season with a double victory.
The GB team of Sophie Wragg (Cardiff university), Georgie Wood (Royal Holloway) and Steph Gunn (Harper Adams) claimed gold in both the combined (dressage and showjumping) and the showjumping competitions in Belgium earlier this month (2-4 April).
There were 15 nations competing at the event held in Leuven. Ireland finished as runners up in the combined, while Poland claimed silver in the showjumping.
The weekend started off with dressage.
“The British team produced a neat team test with only a minor error, finishing in sixth position after dressage,” said a spokesman for the GB team.
Steph made it through to the second round of the individual dressage competition, but narrowly missed out on the third round finishing in seventh place.
In the showjumping all British team members made it through to the second round.
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Steph and Georgie then progressed to the third round but unfortunately drew the same horse ruling out the chance of an all British showjumping final.
Both completed fast rounds but an unlucky pole for Georgie meant that Steph went through to the final against Swedish rider Jocelin Lillenau.
In the final Jocelin had four faults on the first horse and eight faults on the second.
The first ride for Steph was clear until the last fence when she had a late pole. However, she went on to produce a clear round on the second horse claiming gold for showjumping.
Georgie finished fifth and Sophie finished seventh individually.
All the British riders finished individually in the top 12 — with Georgie 12th, Sophie ninth and Steph taking individual silver.
The next competition is hosted by Romania in May.
In January the GB university team took home team gold at the Student Riders’ World Finals in Florida narrowly beating Ireland to the top spot.
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