European Eventing Championships dressage: Kitty King on form

European Eventing Championships dressage: Kitty King and Vendredi Biats — Kitty King and Vendredi Biats at the European Eventing Championships 2021.

(Image credit: Peter Nixon)

Britain’s Kitty King has got her European Eventing Championships dressage campaign underway in Avenches, Switzerland, by scoring a very competitive mark of 24.1, which puts her into fourth place at this stage of the competition.

Riding the 12-year-old grey, Vendredi Biats (pictured at the first trot-up), Kitty is just .2 of a penalty behind Germany’s Michael Jung and fischerWild Wave, .8 of a penalty behind second-placed Piggy March and Brookfield Inocent and 3.2 penalties behind current leaders, Nicola Wilson and JL Dublin.

“I was really chuffed with him – he did a really nice centre line and halt, then around the top corner he just slightly dried up behind my leg, which then was slightly the theme for the whole test,” explained Kitty. “I was kind of like ‘come on, keep taking me forward’, but he tried really hard and and I think it was pretty mistake-free – he got most of his changes, which can be a bit spicy with sometimes as he can be a bit cold-backed, but we didn’t let the team down.”

“He had a lunge this morning and he was bucking and rearing – he ended up having about 25 minutes cantering around and around as he just wouldn’t settle,” she explained. “But he’s come out much better this time, which is a relief because when I was watching him on the lunge I was thinking ‘this is not the day to be a cold-backed day’ – he was much better when I got on the second time, which was a relief!”

Kitty’s score is also great news for the British team, who have a commanding lead after three riders, with Ros Canter and Allstar B yet to perform their European Eventing Championships dressage test. They will start their test at 2.15pm (BST). The British team are currently on a score of 68.3, while Germany are in second on 81 and France are in third on 86.8. Individual rider for Britain, Sarah Bullimore, will ride her test at 11.37am (BST) aboard Corouet.

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Gemma is an experienced journalist, who was a member of H&H staff from 2014 to September 2025. She 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 Epsom in August 2018. Gemma’s has reported from numerous five-star events around Britain and Europe, as well as European championships.

‘This is not the day to be cold-backed’: Kitty King reflects on mistake-free European Eventing Championships dressage performance

Kitty said that Vendredi Biats was very fresh earlier this morning.

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