GLADSTONE, NJ – June 17, 2006 - FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE 

Mary Hilton for Phelps Media Group, Inc. International

Rebecca Hart and Nordkap Sweep the Division to Win 2006 USEF Para Equestrian National Championship at the USET Foundation Dressage Festival of Champions presented by Paul Miller, Inc.

Elisabeth Austin and Olivier Win Inaugural Brentina Cup at Gladstone

Rebecca Hart, 21, of Erie, Pennsylvania, riding her own Nordkap (Noble Roi x Este) won the USEF Para Equestrian Freestyle today, scoring 78.519%, making a clean sweep of the three rounds in the USEF Para Equestrian National Championship at the USET Foundation Dressage Festival of Champions in Gladstone, New Jersey. Hart’s hat trick included victories in the USEF Para Equestrian Team Test on Thursday (71.667%) and the USEF Para Equestrian Individual Championship Test (70.00%) yesterday. Her clean sweep of the division produced an overall score of 73.74% and the championship. Hart was also awarded the Margo O’Callaghan Memorial Trophy.

Hart rode her freestyle today to music and choreography designed by Jason Eric Mumaw, who produced a compilation track from The Phantom of the Opera. “It felt really good,” Hart said of her ride, which was performed at the Grade Three FEI Para Equestrian Test level. The test requires movements comparable to a Third Level dressage test including medium gaits, half-passes, and flying changes. Hart acknowledged that the freestyle is her favorite test and shared that Nordkap, her 14-year-old Hanoverian gelding, also perks up to ‘dance’. “He likes his music – he gets a little bored with the IPEC tests because it’s straight lines,” Hart explained. “And it’s easier to keep his attention and his focus,” she said. “He does better in the freestyle.”

Overall, Hart was pleased with her performances in the 2006 USEF Para Equestrian National Championship. “It felt good. I was so proud of him because he’s such a cool horse. He’s so fun and so honest,” she said. Hart was equally complimentary about the competition at Gladstone.  “It’s been great. The venue is great and the people have been great. Everything’s been really, really good.”

Hart was a member of the USEF Para Equestrian Team that participated in the 2003 World Championship in Belgium and hopes to compete in the 2010 FEI Games in Lexington, Kentucky. “I’d like to do the able-bodied in 20-some years,” Hart said.

Elisabeth Austin and Olivier Win Inaugural Brentina Cup at Gladstone

Elizabeth Austin, 22, of Williston, Vermont, is the first winner of the Brentina Cup, an award launched this year at the USET Foundation Dressage Festival of Champions presented by Paul Miller, Inc. Austin topped a class of six entries aboard Olivier, a 10-year-old brown Dutch warmblood stallion (Idocus x Rowillie), earning a score of 70.390% in the FEI Intermediaire II. Olivier was bred and is currently owned by the winner’s mother, Madeleine Dammers Austin.

Bethany Peslar, 24, of Wellington, Florida, riding More Magic (Maraschino x Radetta) owned by Everglades Dressage, LLC, claimed second with a score of 69.171%. Lauren Sprieser, 21, of Oak Brook, Illinois, riding her own Bellinger placed third, earning 64.927%.  

Debbie McDonald, who rode Brentina to a 2004 Olympic Team Bronze Medal, 2003 World Cup Championship, and 2002 Team Silver Medal at the World Equestrian Games, made the award presentation to Austin.

The purpose of the USEF Brentina Cup Championship Program is to assist and encourage U.S. Young Riders aged 18-26 in making the transition to Senior Grand Prix competitor. The eight horse/rider combinations with the highest overall average scores according to USEF rankings from qualifying competitions held nationally January through June 2006 were invited to Gladstone to compete.

“I’m so excited, I’m so proud to be a part of it,” Austin said of the program. “Brentina and Debbie have done so much for this sport in this country and certainly around the world. They make it fun, so I think to be part of that and to represent that is really, really important.”

Austin noted that for her, one of the most important parts of the program is that the riders did not have to qualify through CDIs. “For me, that made it financially possible,” Austin explained, who qualified through local shows. Austin also pointed out that for horses that are 9,10, and 11 years old, “it’s the perfect stepping stone” to Grand Prix.

Austin has literally known her winning mount all his life. “I was there when he was born and I remember when he came out my mom said ‘oh, look he has expensive markings!’ He has four white feet,” she explained. Olivier, known as “Fizzy,” has only competed at nine horse shows, and the Brentina Cup is only his third recognized FEI competition. Because she has been exhibiting another stallion, Austin explained that financially she couldn’t show both simultaneously.  “I didn’t feel we needed to campaign him a lot. He’s very happy in his job. He loves to show, but for me I don’t think it’s important to show a lot. I really like training,” Austin said, and added that her horses like that schedule as well. “They love it – they’re excited to be away from home.”

Prior to the Brentina Cup qualifiers, the talented stallion’s show records included competing at Third and Fourth Level, and one Prix St. Georges at Lendon Gray’s Youth Dressage Festival (unrecognized competition). Austin and her mother have done all the training, and one season he accompanied 2003 Pan American Team member Pierre St. Jacques to Florida. Olivier is also a breeding stallion. “I’m so proud of him. He’s just a wonderful horse,” Austin enthused, acknowledging that the stallion earns his way through his breeding fees. In today’s ride, Austin described Olivier’s piaffe and passage as “amazing,” especially coming down the centerline where he got “better and hotter in a really nice way. He loves to show and he loves to show off. It’s so easy.” 

Austin, a student at the University of Vermont, took time off to compete in Florida this year and to work as an assistant trainer for Lendon Gray at Gleneden Dressage in Bedford, New York. She plans to return to college in the fall.  

Bethany Peslar, who placed second, is also enthusiastic about the USEF Brentina Cup Championship Program. “As soon as I heard about the program I was really excited about the opportunity to do it,” she said. “It’s a great stepping stone for young riders moving up into Grand Prix against people in their own age group at that level before jumping into professional Grand Prix.” Peslar is based in Pennsylvania for the summer and is in training with Robert Dover at his New Jersey stable. She is a professional rider concentrating on her show career and training her own horses.  More Magic is a 14-year-old bay Westphalian gelding imported from Germany that Peslar has owned since April 2006. Christine Traurig previously showed him in Europe in the Grand Prix. “I’m still getting to know him but I feel like we are becoming a combination now,” Peslar said, and acknowledged that she believes the horse could make a U.S. team. “Our next step is to do the Grand Prix and try to qualify for Devon and see where we go,” Peslar said.

Lauren Sprieser, the third placed rider, was also enthusiastic about the USEF Brentina Cup Championship Program. “The goal of program was obviously to take Young Riders out of Young Riders and gear them up for the Grand Prix program,” she pointed out. “It’s pretty exciting to be getting in on the ground floor and the first generation to go through it.”

Sprieser is a professional rider who graduated from Sarah Lawrence University this year with a degree in public policy and urban planning. She is based in Wauconda, Illinois, and trains with Ken McGrath. Her mount, Bellinger, a 14-year-old bay Trakehner gelding is known as “Billy” and is a special horse for Sprieser who bought him at a sales barn in Germany in January 2003. They are in their fourth season together. “He came to me about 300 pounds underweight and terrified of everything,” Sprieser said, “but when the going gets tough, he listens to me. I will never sell him. He’s a little difficult and has been passed around a lot. He doesn’t trust people right away but has the most tremendous heart. He would do anything for me and it would be wildly unfair for me not to give everything to him.”  The challenge for Sprieser is to adjust to her horse every ride, as she explained, “He’s a funny horse because no matter what horse I have in the warm-up, he’s going to be completely different when I come down centerline. So it’s just a matter of riding the horse I have in the ring.”

Today’s Competition Highlights

USEF Grand Prix Special

In round two of the Collecting Gaits Farm / USEF National Grand Prix Championship / World Equestrian Games Selection Trials today, the identical three riders from round one (the Grand Prix on June 15) again finished at the top of the class of 12.  Steffen Peters of San Diego, California, riding Floriano owned by Laurelyn Browning, earned 77.240% in the USEF Grand Prix Special today to claim his second victory in this championship competition. 

Guenter Seidel of Cardiff, California, aboard Aragon owned by Richard and Jane Brown, earned second place with a score of 73.320%. Leslie Morse of Beverly Hills, California, with her Tip Top 962 scored 72.00% for third.

It was a historic test for Peters in that it was the highest Grand Prix score he has ever earned in his career. Peters had noted after the Grand Prix on Friday that his horse’s score of 74+ that day was most likely his pinnacle, but Floriano proved him wrong today. “I apologize very much for the lies,” quipped Peters, and then admitted that after today’s spectacular performance he broke down into tears leaving the arena. “The bottom line is I consider myself a pretty tough guy so when I come out of the ring crying – it was a pretty good test,” he said. “I was beside myself. It was one of those rides that you don’t have too many times in your life.”

Peters pointed to how expressive, clean, and supple his horse’s test was, especially for a 16-year-old. He also noted that Floriano did not show any tiredness from Friday’s performance or today’s humidity. Peters said it was great that his horse had proved him wrong about his top-scoring ability. “There was definitely more in there. It was so amazing to have him as loose and supple as I had him today but to also have the same amount of energy. He was a little bit more supple and that made all the difference today.”  Peters acknowledged that he took the same risks today as he did in the Grand Prix, with the same successful results. “I felt very comfortable with the extensions and the expression in the passage.”

Peters credited his wife, Shannon, for helping him train. “She’s the main person who keeps an eye on me at home. She has a very good eye and knows how horses need to look in the international arena and that’s the standard we’re trying to maintain.” The U.S. Dressage Team Coach Klaus Balkenhol has also helped Peters this weekend.

Seidel said that Aragon stayed loose and relaxed, but had moments when he got behind his leg. “Overall it was fine,” Seidel said.

Morse was pleased with her test and blamed “rider error” for mistakes in her test. Morse was beaming as she came down the centerline at the end of the test and explained, “I was ecstatic. I couldn’t have asked for anything better.”  Her stallion let out a powerful blow of air moments before the final halt, which both amused and pleased her. “It shows that he’s the kind of horse that at the end of the test he has a lot of gumption,” she said. “He was still right there and he was really happy to be in that arena. For him to do that at the end of the test shows that he was really happy to be there and that’s what you want in a grand prix horse.”

Morse, who recently returned from training with Balkenhol in Germany and competing in the 2006 World Cup Dressage Final in The Netherlands, acknowledged the USEF and the USET Foundation for their support in helping her gain European experience.  “USEF and the Foundation have been so amazing in allowing us this opportunity,” she pointed out. “They’ve allowed me so much opportunity to get so much experience to bring into this important year.”

Peters commented on his assessment of how the U.S. might fare in the coming World Equestrian Games. “If we have three horses that can score between 73 and 75% – that can do some serious damage over there. That’s something we’re capable of doing and need to do against Denmark and Sweden who are in contention for third place.”

FEI Young Rider Prix St. Georges Freestyle

Laura Noyes, 19, of Falmouth, Maine, aboard Syncro topped the class of five riders to win the FEI Young Rider Freestyle Test, earning a score of 67.550%.  Jocelyn Wiese aboard Lamborghini placed second with 67.100%. Ana Digironimo, 16, of Turnersville, New Jersey, and Cadanz placed third with a score of 65.400%.

The FEI Young Rider competition held over three days at the USET Foundation Dressage Festival of Champions presented by Paul Miller, Inc. concluded today and served as the last Region 1 qualifier for the North American Young Riders Championship.  The FEI Young Rider Team Test on Thursday accounted for 60% of the overall score, with riders declaring either the FEI Young Rider Prix St. Georges test on Friday or today’s freestyle to account for 40%.

Noyes was presented with the USET Foundation Terry Koenig Memorial Trophy for her overall scores from the Team and Prix St. Georges tests.

FEI Junior Individual Test

Julie McKean, 18, of Camden, Maine, riding her Trahkener gelding Stavinsky earned 64.850% in the FEI Junior Individual Test and claimed the blue ribbon. McKean is the sole competitor in this division and will compete in the concluding class tomorrow.

Dressage Festival Competition Wraps Up Tomorrow

Schedule for Sunday – June 18th

9:00am             FEI Junior Freestyle Test

10:00am          USEF Intermediaire Freestyle

Presentation of USET Intermediaire I Maria Caleel Scholarship Award

12noon            Lunch

Presentation of USET Foundation Lionel Guerrand-Hermès Memorial Award

12:45pm          Opening Ceremony

1:00pm            USEF Grand Prix Freestyle

The non-profit United States Equestrian Team Foundation supports the competition, training, coaching, travel and educational needs of America’s elite and developing international, high-performance athletes and horses in partnership with the United States Equestrian Federation.  For more information about the USET Foundation or to make a donation, please call (908) 234-1251 or visit its website at www.uset.org

MEDIA CONTACT: Mary Hilton, Phelps Media Group, Inc. International at (561) 561 753-3389 or at info@phelpsmediagroup.com

PHOTO CAPTION: Elisabeth Austin and Olivier won the inaugural Brentina Cup today at the USET Dressage Festival of Champions presented by Paul Miller, Inc. at Gladstone. PHOTO CREDIT: SusanJStickle.com

WEB SITE: Phelps Media Group, Inc. International Press Releases and Photos are available for download at http://www.phelpsmediagroup.com/