FEI World Cup Driving Qualifier

The opening day was a successful one for Skandinavian riders since the first three places in Dressage, Singles category, were occupied by Finnish drivers lead by Sanna Tirkkonen. Werner Ulrich (SUI) took up the leader’s position defeating the local hero and World Champion József Dobrovitz (HUN). Fellow Hungarians, brothers Vilmos and Zoltán Lázár placed third and fourth respectively.

The Singles marathon resulted also in Finnish victory by Ben Simonsen (FIN), who had been in runner up position on the first day.

The results of the Pairs marathon kept up with the varying weather. The best driver was Norbert Kákonyi (HUN), followed by fellow Hungarian Zoltán Nyúl, the only competitor who managed to defend the position conquered on the previous day.

Zoltán Lázár (HUN) was the fastest in five obstacles out seven, thus winning the four-in-hand marathon. Werner Ulrich followed with little more than five penalty points, having been the fastest only in the water obstacle. The gap between Ulrich, László Juhász (HUN) in third position and Dobrovitz in fourth was less than one penalty point.

As a result, Ulrich was in the lead after two phases, followed by Zoltán Lázár and Dobrovitz. Since the difference between the best three drivers was no more than a single ball, everybody waited the last exciting battle.

The 20 obstacles with three combined efforts did not cause any problem to Vilmos Lázár in cones driving. The hero of the day was the only four-in-hand driver with no faults at all; he was the best in that phase but manged to get into fourth position overall.

With his seventh place in obstacle driving Dobrovitz placed third overall.

The younger Lázár, Zoltán finished the course with 5,26 penalty points wich took him to sixth place in cones and although he had been the best in the marathon, he took runner up position at the end of the three phases together (135,57 total).

Another former World Champion, Werner Ulrich got 3,45 penalties in the cones and, having come out first in dressage, second in marathon and fourth in obstacle driving he became the overall winner of the event with a total of 132,09 points.

The best overall driver in Singles was Ben Simonsen (FIN) with his second, first and third places while in the Pairs the overall winner was Gábor Plaszkó (HUN) being the third, fifth and first in the individual phases.