All Quiet on the Western Front at Luhmühlen CCI5* Final Horse Inspection

One year ago, the Sunday morning final horse inspection at Luhmühlen felt like a pretty fraught endeavour – the sort of thing you watch with a gentle but unrelenting clench of the bumcheeks. Today, no such muscular endeavours: all fifteen horses who completed yesterday’s CCI5* cross-country came forward to present, and all were accepted without further ado.

There was ever so slightly more to think about in the CCI4*-S, which also necessitates a trot-up thanks to the final-day showjumping format. Two horses were held through the course of proceedings – Germany’s Anna Haag and Little Caterpillar, and New Zealand’s Dan Jocelyn and Blackthorn Cruise, who sit 38^th and 34^th, respectively, in the standings – but both were happily given the nod to complete the competition upon reinspection. Three horses, too, were withdrawn overnight: Germany’s Felix Etzel and TSF Polartanz, 12^thovernight; Australia’s Hannah Klep and Tulara Chicouve, 39^th; and the US’s Cosby Green and Highly Suspicious, who were 9^th after a classy clear round yesterday.

Now, we look ahead to both classes’ showjumping finales, beginning with the CCI5* at 11.25 a.m. local time (10.25 a.m. BST/5.25 a.m. EST). Caroline Harris holds a slim 2.7 penalty lead with the 2024 Pau winner D. Day, who hasn’t had a rail down in an FEI competition in three years, while Emily King and Valmy Biats in second are ordinarily very secure showjumpers but have had a few rails in their topsy-turvy spring season, which has seen Emily battle back from injury. In third place, Boyd Martin and Shanroe Cooley are something of a floating question mark: the partnership is new, the horse is a debutant at the level, and while he hasn’t had a rail in two years, he also hasn’t ever jumped after a test of the length and breadth he faced yesterday. He’s well supported in the warm-up ring, though: Peter Wylde is in situ and locked in to help Boyd try to secure a five-star victory on behalf of Liz Halliday, who produced the gelding to CCI4*-L.

It’s hard to imagine the winner today coming from outside the top three – even if you can shelve Caroline and D. Day’s exceptional form in this phase, the margins aren’t particularly tight across the leaderboard. With just fifteen left in the hunt from our original line-up of 21, we’re looking at a 65.9 penalty spread from top to bottom, and if Jonelle Price and her 2022 Pau winner, Grappa Nera, were to jump into the lead, that would require two rails and time penalties from our leaders, a rail and time for Emily and Valmy, and at least three seconds’ worth of time penalties for Boyd and ‘Dallas’.

But this is five-star, and anything can happen – including, a couple of years ago, the first rails since CCI2*-S level for Ros Canter’s Izilot DHI, a statistical near impossibility that completely rewrote the story of the week and gave Belgium its first-ever five-star champion in Lara de Liedekerke-Meier. Luhmühlen, like Pau in the autumn, presents notoriously big, difficult showjumping courses on its surfaced arena, and everyone – including the odds-on favourites – will have to work hard out there to make a clear round happen.

Julia Krajewski and fourth-placed Tullabeg Platinum. Photo by Tilly Berendt.

The CCI4*-S, similarly, will have to face a serious challenge, but has a clear outlier with a serious lead: Julia Krajewski and Uelzener’s Nickel have a rail and change in hand over second-placed Lara de Liedekerke-Meier and Kiarado d’Arville. That class will get underway this afternoon from 14.10 local time (13.10 BST/8.10 a.m. EST). As usual, all the action will be broadcast on Horse&Country TV, and we’ll be bringing you the full story from each class, too. Until then, and for one last time this week: Go Eventing!