On Friday Dutch Harrie Smolders sealed the deal for his team at the CHIO Rotterdam Longines Nations Cup. "Monaco and me love this kind of pressure! I love it because when your round really counts for something that brings out the best in me!”, Smolders said.
Asked how he manages to handle extreme pressure like he did today to clinch the win, Smolders replied, “I knew I had to go clear, one down and we lost.
I just focus on the things I need to do to make it as easy as possible for my horse. That’s probably easier said than done, but it has to do with experience, with the right focus, a cool mind, and then you have to execute it.
“But Monaco and me love this kind of pressure! I love it because when your round really counts for something that brings out the best in me!”, he said.
he Dutch delight was perfectly understandable and quite contagious. Smolders spoke about his great day.
“It’s an amazing feeling, we had a full house, the Royal Family is always here for the Nations Cup and we had such a great atmosphere. After the first round we were only one fault away from the lead so we knew there were still chances and we had to step up, do better, and all our riders did an amazing job in the second round. It was a tough course but very well built, not super-big but an intelligent course with a tough last line so you really had to know what you were doing”, Smolders said.
“Monaco was again outstanding! He loves Rotterdam, he always feels amazing here, he enjoys this show so much and he’s such a smart horse. He knows when it’s important….”, he added.
And what about that tricky line from the triple combination to the following vertical? “It was a half-distance and you were riding into the corner there, it was a tall vertical with only three rails and a very delicate fence so you really had to know your horse very well, what suits them best, and you had to use the gear-box! You needed a horse that is obedient and can lengthen or shorten the stride very well to ride that”, Smolders explained.
source: FEI
Asked how he manages to handle extreme pressure like he did today to clinch the win, Smolders replied, “I knew I had to go clear, one down and we lost.
I just focus on the things I need to do to make it as easy as possible for my horse. That’s probably easier said than done, but it has to do with experience, with the right focus, a cool mind, and then you have to execute it.
“But Monaco and me love this kind of pressure! I love it because when your round really counts for something that brings out the best in me!”, he said.
he Dutch delight was perfectly understandable and quite contagious. Smolders spoke about his great day.
“It’s an amazing feeling, we had a full house, the Royal Family is always here for the Nations Cup and we had such a great atmosphere. After the first round we were only one fault away from the lead so we knew there were still chances and we had to step up, do better, and all our riders did an amazing job in the second round. It was a tough course but very well built, not super-big but an intelligent course with a tough last line so you really had to know what you were doing”, Smolders said.
“Monaco was again outstanding! He loves Rotterdam, he always feels amazing here, he enjoys this show so much and he’s such a smart horse. He knows when it’s important….”, he added.
And what about that tricky line from the triple combination to the following vertical? “It was a half-distance and you were riding into the corner there, it was a tall vertical with only three rails and a very delicate fence so you really had to know your horse very well, what suits them best, and you had to use the gear-box! You needed a horse that is obedient and can lengthen or shorten the stride very well to ride that”, Smolders explained.
source: FEI