Katydid Combine Driving Event - Results & Winner’s Profiles

Advanced Single Pony
Sherri Dolan of Windsor, SC put down a nice lead in dressage on Thursday with a 49.79 from a mixed panel of International and US judges including Sarah Mullin (IRE) and Dr. Franz Vetter GER).  She led the pack again with her mighty yet diminutive Shetland pony- Smoke- with a blazing marathon and despite coming third after cones, held onto first place.  It looks as though Smoke won’t be going it alone for long   as Sherri recently acquired a match for Smoke.  At a recent Welsh show, fellow competitors Randi and Keady Cadwell, ran across the mirror image of Smoke- so, aptly named, we should be seeing Smoke and Mirrors out together in the pairs division in the future!
Watch the Video of her Dressage Test

Advanced Single Horse
Kate Shields of Middleburg, VA is notorious for her skillfully executed dressage tests. With her homebred cob, Hastening Winslow, she had the best dressage score across all divisions and classes at Katydid with a 40.32.  Winslow has just begun his Advanced career but he is doing it on the successful bloodlines of Kate’s prior champions.  Kate is an avid foxhunter who also competes in eventing and her horses share her versatility. This time out, she and Winslow led all three sections to win her division by nearly 70 points!   

Advanced Horse Team
A disappointing score in dressage left long-time CDE veteran Bill Long near the bottom of the competition after dressage but Bill pulled out all the stops on the marathon with Jack Wetzell’s lovely team of black Gelderlanders.  Jack’s horses are transitioning from a coaching career to make a bid for the World Equestrian Games to be held in Kentucky next year.  Bill also won the cones section of his class keeping ahead of 2nd place Gavin Robson of Australia and neighbor Keady Cadwell of Southern Pines, NC with a 23 point lead.  Bill commented “Anytime you can get under 100 points on marathon with a team- you had a good run!”
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Intermediate Single Pony
Charlotte Trentleman from Anthony Florida competed with her Haflinger mare, Final Deal a.k.a. "Mary", along with her husband, navigator and groom Chris, a real estate attorney in his other life. Trentleman who trains on a regular basis with Bill Lower is a Large S Dressage judge has been driving since 1998. Trentleman has had consistent success with her mare, finishig fourth at The Lexington CDE in October, and fifth at Live Oak in March. But at the Katydid CDE, , the pair had one of the few clean cones rounds of the day, holding the lead throughout the entire event.

Intermediate Pair Pony
The always cheerful and witty (no pun intended) Caroline Whittle, a UK transplant now residing in NC drove High Country Haflingers’ Lillie and Britton to win the dressage on Friday. Her marathon score bested many of the singles in her Division despite driving a pair of substantial ponies.  A close second on cones didn’t hurt and she held on to the lead for the division win over second place Ray Mansur.

Intermediate Pony Team
Was swept from beginning to end by Eleanor Gallagher, a long time student of Bill Longs’ with her snappy four in hand of Welsh ponies.  Her more than 50 point lead on marathon over 2nd place Heather Schneider gave her a breather as she negotiated the difficult cones phase.  Eleanor also resides in Southern Pines, NC and she and her husband Tom are proud grandparents to Junior Driver Brianna Ek who placed second in the Single Pony class in the Intermediate division.  

Intermediate Single Horse
Marcie Quist of Vass, NC with her hackney horse led the class in dressage with a 46.67 and held onto her blue despite a fifth on marathon and a one ball penalty in cones.  Marcie is a licensed American Driving Society Technical Delegate and was accompanied her trustworthy navigator by Craig Kellog, also an ADS official and clinician.  

Intermediate Pair Horse
The single competitor in the class was Rachel Nicely of Strawberry Plains, Tennessee. Rachel, drove a pair of Freisian/saddlebred cross horses, Ritza and Bella. Nicely who operates her family's Riverplains Farm near Knoxville, got what she came for, valuable experience at the Intermediate level with her head turning horses. Since having a baby last year, Nicely has been moving up the ranks with this talented pair and is looking forward to a competitive 2010.

Preliminary Single Pony
The largest class in the entire show watched as the International pony pairs driver Tracey Morgan of DE left the rest of the 13 competitors in the sandy dust. Tracey left her small pair of Dartmoors behind this time and turned up with a lovely single Morgan stallion belonging to a Jennifer Sims of Upperville, VA.  After garnering the Best Preliminary Dressage award on Friday, she and navigator Kenny Cox took on some big guns on the marathon course in class competitors Sara Schmidt and Muffy Seaton- both with new ponies.  The big class was highly competitive right through Sunday with four double clear cones rounds but Tracey remained victorious and finished on the only score in the double digits with a 92.69!

Preliminary Pair Pony
Boots Wright of Ocala, FL continued her winning ways in the Pairs division after competing for many years at the FEI level with a Four-in-hand of ponies. Taking the lead after dressage Boots with a score of 50 to Claire Reid’s 55, Boots took her time with a fourth place finish in marathon then posted a double clear in cones to win her class.  Her ponies included Blunder a Welsh Section C cob imported from the UK, Miarcik a New Forest pony and Marico a German Riding Pony.  A photograph of the Wright’s We Both Farms pair served as the cover of the Katydid program and in ads promoting the event this year.

Preliminary Pony Tandem
Driving a tandem is perhaps one of the most difficult of all of the driving configurations.  Described as “pushing a rope” a tandem is a bit like half of a Four-in-hand.  A wheeler is harnessed single style to the carriage while the leader is only connected to the wheeler and driver by a set of traces and reins. The leader has got to be trustworthy and solid in his training as the driver has very little control over him as compared to the wheeler.  Tandems are very popular in the UK but rarely seen in a US CDE.  Only three tandems took on the Katydid Tandem Challenge with Jennifer Matheson emerging with the low score lead over even the only horse tandem in the show.  With the 2005 World Single Pony Champion stallion Danny Lou (imported from Germany) in the lead and Lisa Stroud’s Connemara, Spiderman, in the wheel, Jennifer had only two balls down as she nimbly snaked through the twisting course.

Preliminary Single Horse
The eyes of Texas were upon Bill Peacock’s Lone Star marathon turnout as he narrowly missed 1st in each phase of the competition yet finished with a win on the board.  Bill hails from Bellville, TX and drives Batman a Friesian cross horse.

Preliminary Pair Horse
Preliminary Tandem Horse
Each was won by their sole entries- Fred Deerborn of Danville, kentucky for the former and Joanie Schisler in the latter. Fred drives a pair of Morgan horses that he owns known as Yoder and Noah. Joanie is from neighboring Aiken, SC and drove Winston, an Arab cross and Churchill, a Morgan horse.