Natasha Baker has claimed Britain’s fourth individual medal in Herning, finishing second in the Orifarm Healthcare FEI World Para Dressage Championships results for the grade III individual competition.
It was another Lottie who helped earn the silver medal – as Natasha’s mare Keystone Dawn Chorus in known in the stable – and Natasha joked that she thought the Dimaggio daughter had been taking tips from Lottie Fry’s double gold medallist Glamourdale overnight.
“I think she wanted to take off like a rocket ship, like Glamourdale does,” joked Natasha, after posting 73.97%, a solid mark but short of her best. “That was the quickest test I’ve ever ridden – I was hanging on for grim death.”
Natasha explained that it wasn’t that the atmosphere had fazed Lottie – even though the World Para Dressage Championships are offering the biggest audiences most of the para horses have seen since 2019. Instead, having had the best part of six weeks off with illness, after a delayed start to her World Para Dressage Championships campaign due to getting married and going on honeymoon, Natasha admitted was not as fit as she would have liked to have been, and therefore found it harder to hold a fresh Lottie together.
“Normally if she’s feeling like that I can get her together, but I’ve only been back in the saddle for two weeks,” said Natasha, who had a chest infection at the start of the summer, and had to withdraw from Hartpury CDI3* in July as she was still not fully recovered.
“I was on three lots of antibiotics and I’m still on some tablets and supplements right now to try to keep me healthy,” she said. “So just to be here and be selected and for the selectors to have the confidence in me that I can come out here and perform, I’m just so happy with the way she dealt with everything in there.
“As athletes we come here for bling, but we also come here to do our best and there’s honestly nothing I could have done better in that test,” she added of her silver medal.
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World Para Dressage Championships results: other medalists
It was Denmark’s Tobias Thorning Joergensen who won gold, soaring into the lead in the World Para Dressage Championships results with a huge score of 78.68%. This marks the fifth individual gold medal as he completes the “triple crown” – winning gold at consecutive European Championships, Paralympics and World Championships.
The USA’s Rebecca Hart finished in the bronze medal position on the World Para Dressage Championships results table, scoring 73.§5% with El Corona Texel.
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