Saturday, November 9, heralded the busiest day of the 2024 US Dressage Finals presented by Adequan®, with 14 titles up for grabs from First Level to Grand Prix at the Kentucky Horse Park. The 2024 US Dressage Finals, presented by Adequan® concludes on Sunday, November 10.

Injury Almost Stops Play

After aggravating a year-old groin injury two weeks before the 2024 Finals, Jeremy Steinberg could not even canter in one direction in his first ride on his five-year-old Henry at the Kentucky Horse Park. But, when it came to crunch-time, Steinberg pulled off a 74.583% winning test in the Open First Level Championship to secure the title.

In a repeat of the result in the class at the Region 1 Championships, Steinberg’s friend and student Allison Cyprus finished runner-up with 72.917% on another five-year-old, her own Oceana ISF.

Steinberg bought Henry from the Netherlands as a two-year-old after spotting an online photo of the son of For Final and fell for him.

Cute Face

“I honestly bought him based on his cute face,” admitted Steinberg, who hails from Aiken, SC, and co-owns the horse with Carolyn and James McMullen. “Henry showed up at the farm, we all fell in love with him, and he’s become family.

“I didn’t think I was going to be able to ride this weekend, so the expectations were pretty low because I haven’t ridden the last two weeks. It was such a rough couple of weeks building up to Finals that I couldn’t be happier with what he did today,” added Steinberg.

Small Mistake

One small mistake, when Henry switched leads behind at the end of the extended canter, was the only blip on an otherwise lovely test. Steinberg has trained reserve champion Cyprus since she was 12 years old and on ponies, finally persuading her to base herself in Aiken two years ago.

Competition concludes on Sunday, November 10, with the final 10 championship titles to be decided. The full digital show program is available here. Follow the action via the USDF Facebook page and the US Dressage Finals website, plus live online streaming of all the action from the Alltech Arena on USEF Network. To learn more about the US Dressage Finals presented by Adequan® and read daily news, visit the official US Dressage Finals event website. Start times and results can be found on www.horseshowoffice.com.