Grand Manoeuvre “Milo” achieves 13th Place at Europeans

margie 9 dressage

Well what an amazing European Championships talk about highs and lows. From start to finish, I am so unbelievably proud of Grand Manoeuvre, he tried his heart out in the dressage to get a Personal Best of 37.8, it was so exciting to be in top 10 going into XC.

Then Saturday, well, what can I say Milo gave me an incredible ride in the torrential rain, he was totally unreal round the tough cross country, jumping clear with 10.8 time pens! He’s not the easiest horse to ride inside the time as he jumps high and gets strong, and by the end of the day watching how the course took it’s toll, I was over the moon to finish in 9th place.

Sadly though by the end of Sunday I was absolutely devastated that the SJ didn’t go to plan, although it takes nothing away from how thrilled, I am of Grand Manoeuvre who has shown his class this week with his final place of 13th at a European Championship. It’s a solid start to a relatively new partnership so looking to the future, it’s really exciting, as there is so much more to come from him!

We had some great fun on twitter as well with our forming a sort of B team called “Franny’s Angels”, myself, Holly Woodhead, Gemma Tattersall & of course Francis Whittingon & our chef d’equipe was Chris Tattersall (Gemma’s dad), sadly we dropped from second to fourth, we were just pipped by the French!

Great to be one of twelve Brits and to see the team win Silver and for Kitty King being placed the best Brit at 4th. Congratulations to an amazing German performance & it’s safe to say Micheal Jung is a Unique! An Incredible achievement to win 3 European titles but more outstanding on 3 different horses!

The sport of eventing is a massive team effort so THANK YOU to everyone who supports “Colllett Eventing” fantastic owners, sponsors, family, and an amazing team of staff and equestrian professionals.

My mum and some of my owners came up to support me, which was wonderful, a massive Thank you must go to Zanie King for being the best groom I could ask for last week…. Grand Manoeuvre looked immaculate all week and when I needed a talking to in xc start box, she was amazing!

I am always completely over whelmed with all the hundreds of messages that I receive through Facebook and Twitter, it’s wonderful everyone takes the time to express their kind support, I do appreciate it so thank you.

I am so grateful to his owner Diana Chappell for giving me the opportunity to ride such an amazingly talented horse, who has a heart of gold.

Finally it’s an amazing privilege for everyone involved with “Collett Eventing” to be part of World Class programme & Equestrian Team GBR which is funded by UK Sport, The National Lottery & helps us on the on the way to Championships and with the aim of Winning medals at the Rio Olympics in 2016.

THANK YOU