Barbury international horse trials: Wiltshire’s Kitty King wins the two star competition

Day three of the St James’s Place Barbury International Horse Trials (Saturday, June 30) brought out huge crowds to watch the pre-Olympic events and see how several international teams were shaping up for the Greenwich Park competitions later in July.

The four star Olympic combined training event – featuring plenty of British and international Olympic riders and horses – was won by locally based Laura Collett riding Rayef (pictured – photo by Katy Vincent). Her clear round in the show jumping gave her the advantage over the overnight leader Chris Burton.

Laura said she was really pleased with Rayef’s performance:  “At Barbury there is a lot going on, including the cross country being right next door to the show jumping so there are many distractions but he really concentrated and focused on the job. We will now go to Aachen in Germany next week”.

Wiltshire talent was also successful in the keenly fought two star competition (section B) which was won by Kitty King and Persimmon. 

They had a clear cross country round to win by five marks over Australia’s Paul Tapner who’s based at Highworth.

Kitty was full of praise for Persimmon’s performance; “I am thrilled with this result because he is only a young horse. He is seven and in his second season and to lead from the front and beat Olympic horses is excellent”.

British team Olympic team members Piggy French, Zara Phillips and William Fox-Pitt finished in third, fifth and seventh places.

Zara Phillips was riding High Kingdom – the horse she will ride at the London Olympics in Juily.

On a lighter note, but all in a good charitable cause, was the popular first round of the Hit Air Pro Bull Rider series.  This set a team of race jockeys against a team of eventers to see how long they could stay attached to a mechanical bucking bull – called Billy. 

Robert ‘Choc’ Thornton led the jockeys’ team with Richard Johnson, Andrew Tinkler and Wayne Hutchinson. Going first for the eventers Laura Collett put up an amazing time – it was obviously her day.  She was followed by Lauren Shannon, Paul Tapnerand Mark Todd.The jockeys couldn’t beat the eventers’ times – even with the sporting assistance of Barbury’s resident steeplechase trainer Alan King.  It was all in aid of the Injured Jockeys Fund.