British showjumper Scott Brash and 10-year-old rising star Hello Folie landed the CSI5* grand prix of Doha, Qatar, on Saturday (25 January).
This was a real coming-of-age performance for an exciting mare who was making her grand prix debut at this level for owners Lady Pauline Harris and Lady Pauline Kirkham.
“I’ve felt her building up well. I thought she was ready for her first five-star grand prix but to win on your first attempt is pretty good, so we’re very happy with her,” Scott told H&H.
Watch the videoThe double Olympic gold medallist and Hello Folie were drawn early in an 11-way jump-off to decide top honours in the final contest of the three-week Doha Tour. Scott and the French-bred Luidam daughter produced an eye-catching round, coming home two seconds quicker than runner-up Abdel Said of Belgium riding Bonne Amie, with Portuguese rider Duarte Seabra third on Dourados 2.
“She feels very confident, she loves the job and she just wants to win, which makes life a lot easier,” said Scott.
Scott Brash on Hello Folie: “We’ve taken our time producing her”
Hello Folie was bred in France by Claire Gouin. She is out of Diamant De Semilly mare Thara Nantuel, and was originally named Folie De Nantuel. French showjumper Mark Dilasser rode and produced Folie as a young horse.
“I did see her competing in Fontainebleau [in 2022] where she looked careful, but she just hadn’t quite put it all together, so you’d maybe have questioned in those early days whether she had all the jump,” explained Scott. “But Marc produced her very well, then Shane Breen bought her and had her for a couple of months before I saw her at his place.
“So we bought her from Shane and we’ve had her for a couple of years now, but we’ve taken our time producing her – we’ve always felt she’s a fantastic horse, but she just needed a bit of time. She jumps quite high, so you want to make sure you’re not rushing those kind of horses. But the Doha Tour is a great place to build them up; she jumped a couple of four-stars, then that was a nice introduction to her first five-star grand prix in the same ring. We’re super excited by her.”
Back at the top – hopefully the future is bright
Scott obviously enjoyed a year to remember when winning team gold for Great Britain at the Paris 2024 Olympics with top horse Hello Jefferson, but the Scotsman’s last top tier grand prix success came at the end of 2022.
“It’s been a while!” he said. “It always takes time to rebuild your string when you’ve had a couple of top horses retire and so on, and you have to spend a lot of time on those new horses, but I think we have some nice young ones coming up and hopefully the future is bright.
“It’s been rewarding too – we all work very hard, so it’s good for the whole team and the owners and everyone involved to see the progression with a horse like Hello Folie, then to actually do it on the big day is good for everyone. It means a lot.”
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