Emile Faurie was crowned British national dressage champion at the Lemieux National Dressage Championships after winning the grand prix freestyle on Theodora Livanos’s Dono Di Maggio, much to the delight of a large and enthusiastic crowd.
The freestyle win added to their second in the grand prix was easily enough to secure them the overall title, his third in total and the first since 1994 when he won with Virtu.
Dono Di Maggio was part of Britain’s 2018 bronze winning WEG team, before being sold to Greek young rider Theodora Livanos two years ago.
“The horse stayed here with us and while Theodora is recovering from surgery, I have got the ride back,” said Emile. “I was quite surprised with him today – he’s normally very chilled, but he was really on edge going in there. It’s an amazing venue and had an amazing atmosphere, but he kept it together and gave me a great ride.”
This year the horse has exclusively campaigned internationally winning both the grand prix and grand prix special on his last outing at Zandhoven in August.
The same three combinations in the grand prix took the top three in the freestyle albeit with a bit of a change round. Becky Moody’s ride Famke PK added a second in the freestyle to her third in the grand prix with a very technical floorplan while grand prix winner Gareth Hughes was left ruing a mistake in his left canter pirouette with KK Dominant, which also affected his one tempi changes straight after.
It was a perfect class to end the National Dressage Championships held for the first time at Somerford Park Farm in Cheshire, a new home which was met with universal and enthusiastic approval.
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