Atomic speeds to victory

Some of the circuit's most talented junior stars maintain their form to take top honours

TABITHA KYLE switched her focus back to ponies, after contesting the Europeans on the junior squad, to win the 148cm national title by more than eight seconds on Atomic Du Bary, jumping one of two double clears.

“I chose to do the Europeans on the junior team because I’m getting too big on the ponies now, I am almost having fences down with my feet,” Tabitha said. “Thankfully they’re still wanting to jump with me.”

Tabitha came to the show straight from Wales and West and targeted just the 148cm final before heading to Valkenswaard, where she went on to top four pony classes she contested, including the 1.30m grand prix with Atomic.

“He’s secretly my favourite,” Tabitha added. “He tries so hard but he’s so casual about it. He finds everything so easy.”

After being runner-up in a run of championships last year, including the 128cm final at Horse of the Year Show (HOYS) and losing out by just 0.01sec in the Pony of the Year Show (POYS) 128cm grand prix, Emily Gulliver deserved a sash.

It was her mare Tekila Du Bary who turned her fortunes around, heading the 138cm national championship by 0.65sec over ever-present rival Raphaela Dawson (Noah’s Lady). Emily had piloted two rides through to the 13-strong jump-off, while Raphaela had her bets hedged with three.

“Raphaela still had one to go after me and it was quite scary having to watch,” said Emily, who has been riding 16-year-old Tekila for three years. “Tekila is very fast in a jump-off and it helped having ridden my less experienced pony round already, especially in figuring out how level the distance was from one to two.”