ph. Stefano Grasso/LGCT
Tonight’s qualifier for the Longines Global Champions Tour Grand Prix of Antwerp on Saturday, concluded with a thrilling jump-off between 21 riders clear from the first round. It was the last line of course designer Luc Musette’s jump-off course which proved to be decisive, and Brazil’s Marlon Modolo Zanotelli and Zerlin M came out on top. The distance down to the last caused a few problems, with the last fence particularly significant to the final standings.
France’s Pénélope Leprevost and Sultane des Ibis took an early lead before being caught by Marlon, although Kent Farrington with the impressive grey, Willow, posed a significant threat later on, just missing out by two hundredths of a second. Last to go was Belgium’s Olivier Philippaerts, who was eager to win in front of a vibrant home crowd, but he could only do enough to finish third with Aragorn van Schuttershof.
Earlier today, Saudi Arabia’s Abdullah Al Sharbatly took the CSI5* Topsport Vlaanderen 1.45 competition aboard his newly acquired Domingo. The pair took home the first five star competition of the GCT event in Antwerp in a time of 57.65 seconds, considerably faster than Germany’s second place finisher, Hans-Dieter Dreher and Colore. Sharbatly, who recently partnered with the 12 year old gelding, looks to be in top form with the well-know speedy mount, who was previously stationed with Belgium’s Niels Bruynseels and with Germany’s Daniel Deusser before that. In third place today was USA’s Paris Sellon, riding her very own Belle, finishing ahead of France’s Simon Delestre and Japan’s Taizo Sugitani.
Source: LGCT