Big names and previous winners are among the British open championship entries at this weekend’s Festival of British Eventing.
Previously held at Gatcombe Park, this year the championships will be running at Hartpury in Gloucestershire, alongside the venue’s NAF Five Star International Hartpury Horse Trials (8–11 August)..
The British open championship was abandoned owing to heavy rain in 2023, so 2022 winners, New Zealand’s Tim Price and Vitali, line up to defend their crown this weekend.
There are 37 horses entered for this class; joining Tim will be Oliver Townend and Cooley Rosalent, who will be hard to beat owing to this mare’s form in 2024, which includes winning the five-star at Kentucky and a recent victory in the CCI4*-S at Burgham.
Kitty King and her top horse Vendredi Biats, with whom she won team gold and individual silver at the 2023 European Championships and has since been on flying form, will join Oliver in the line-up.
Valmy Biats and Emily King will be ones to watch too, having not finished outside the top five in all six of this gelding’s starts this year, including fourth at Badminton and fifth at Aachen.
Tom McEwen, who won Olympic team gold in Paris last week and has just become world number one for the first time, is entered with CHF Cooliser, a gutsy mare who was last seen finishing second in Luhmühlen’s five-star.
Zara Tindall rides her top horse Class Affair in the British open. He is among the contenders in this class who will then likely head to Burghley Horse Trials; some of these horses may not run across country at Hartpury, depending on their riders’ build-up plan for the five-star.
Jonelle Price lines up with Grappa Nera and Chilli’s Midnight Star and both are worth keeping an eye on.
The British novice championship is the largest of the three main championship classes with 52 entries, and the British intermediate championship plays host to 40 entries.
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