The second day of competition at the U.S. Dressage Festival of Champions brought back entries in the Neue Schule/USEF Intermediaire I National Championship and the Adequan®/USEF Para Dressage National Championship for their second tests of the show.

Photo – Christian Simonson and Son of a Lady. ©Leslie Potter/US Equestrian

USEF Intermediaire I Dressage National Championship

The Intermediaire I entries completed the Intermediate I Test today, and Christian Simonson (Ventura, Calif.) came back for his second win with Son of a Lady, Christina Morgan and Clifton Simonson’s 2011 Danish Warmblood gelding, after yesterday’s victory in the Prix St. Georges Test. The pair posted a 73.469% in today’s test, keeping them in first-place standing for the national champion title. The PSG Test accounted for 40% of the total championship score and the I-1 contributes 45%. The remaining 15% comes from the FEI Intermediate I Freestyle, which will take place on Thursday afternoon.

Class Results

Current Overall Standings:

• Christian Simonson and Son of a Lady
• Nora Batchelder and Nova
• Charlotte Jorst and Federle

From the Mixed Zone:

Take us through your test today.

Christian Simonson:

Today I rode [Zeaball Diawind] first and had a couple of little mistakes, so then coming in on ‘Sonny’ today I really wanted to deliver a good, clean test. I think that was my biggest goal. This is the last day of the important tests for Pan Am observation, so I wanted to make sure I delivered again for that as well. But he’s such a special horse, I just love him. He’s so honest. When he gets hot in there, there were a couple of times I was like, ‘Easy, buddy,’ and he actually listened to me. He really calms down. I think over the past two years going all over the world, we’ve kind of developed this really deep level of trust with each other where I can be like, ‘All right, let’s do this,’ and he’s like, ‘Okay, Dad. Let’s do it,’ and that was kind of the feeling today.

What can we look forward to in your freestyle?

CS: I’m really excited, I actually have a brand-new freestyle for Son of a Lady that is a little more difficult than my freestyle in the past, so I’m excited to rock out with him in there, and we’ll see how it goes.

Full Schedule and Results

2023 U.S. Dressage Festival of Champions Livestream

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