Claudia Hay and Euro Sport Centavos won the prestigious Bostock International Olympic Cup at New Zealand’s Farmlands Horse of the Year Show in Hastings on Sunday. The combination headed a 17-strong field, which included previous winners Katie Laurie and Maurice Beatson, and international riders Daniel Meech and Helen McNaught-McFarlane. Hay, the first South Islander to win the $200,000 Olympic Cup since the 1970s, and her black German-bred stallion also won the second-richest class of the show, the McMillan Equine Feeds Silver Fern Stakes. The first round of the Olympic Cup saw clears from just four combinations – teenager Amanda Wilson and her coloured horse Showtym Cassanova, followed by Hay, then former Olympian Meech on his imported mare Queen of Dance WHS, and finally McNaught-McFarlane on her quirky young grey Carnutelabryere. Those with 12 faults or fewer came back for the second round where five-time winner Laurie went clear on her 2014 Olympic Cup champ Dunstan Springfield. Beatson and his 20-year-old star My Gollywog, who won the cup in 2013, picked up just a single time fault, to finish on nine faults from the two rounds. Hay also went clear but had a single time fault, to sit on one, while Laurie and her youngster Dunstan Breeze went clear to sit on eight, and McNaught-McFarlane had a rail at the second to finish on four. Hay also won the Leading Rider of the Show.
Claudia Hay and Euro Sport Centavos won the prestigious Bostock International Olympic Cup at New Zealand’s Farmlands Horse of the Year Show in Hastings on Sunday. The combination headed a 17-strong field, which included previous winners Katie Laurie and Maurice Beatson, and international riders Daniel Meech and Helen McNaught-McFarlane. Hay, the first South Islander to win the $200,000 Olympic Cup since the 1970s, and her black German-bred stallion also won the second-richest class of the show, the McMillan Equine Feeds Silver Fern Stakes. The first round of the Olympic Cup saw clears from just four combinations – teenager Amanda Wilson and her coloured horse Showtym Cassanova, followed by Hay, then former Olympian Meech on his imported mare Queen of Dance WHS, and finally McNaught-McFarlane on her quirky young grey Carnutelabryere. Those with 12 faults or fewer came back for the second round where five-time winner Laurie went clear on her 2014 Olympic Cup champ Dunstan Springfield. Beatson and his 20-year-old star My Gollywog, who won the cup in 2013, picked up just a single time fault, to finish on nine faults from the two rounds. Hay also went clear but had a single time fault, to sit on one, while Laurie and her youngster Dunstan Breeze went clear to sit on eight, and McNaught-McFarlane had a rail at the second to finish on four. Hay also won the Leading Rider of the Show.