William Fox-Pitt held onto his overnight lead in the CCI*** with a clear show jumping round to finish on his dressage score of 44.0 penalties at Blenheim Horse Trials. Riding Parklane Hawk, a New Zealand thoroughbred who raced until the age of seven. “He would go off like a rocket and out like a light,” laughed William. The change in career has obviously suited this horse and his speed across country proved useful being one of only seven horses to finish inside the time. “I've always had faith him but I never expected him to win in a field of top horses and riders," he said. Parklane Hawk will now take a well earned holiday before coming out fresh for his campaign in 2011.

Brits dominate

It was a British 1, 2, 3, 4 with William just 1.6 penalties ahead of Ruth Edge who led after the dressage phase, but 3.2 time penalties on the cross country proved costly, dropping her to second place. Ruth has had a busy weekend also riding at the Dressage Deluxe National Dressage Championships on Zero and Charlesfield Dante. Zero was third in the Elementary and eigth in the Medium with Charlesfield Dante sixth in the Elementary and tenth in the Medium. After attending the dressage prize giving Ruth returned to Blenheim just in time to walk the show jumping course.

Piggy French finished third and fourth on Chase The Moon and Flying Machine (last year's CIC*** winner here) with double clears on both with just 0.8 time penalties cross country and one more in the show jumping for Flying Machine. Thoughts now turn to WEG for team GB for which Blenheim has been a welcome distraction for the nerves.

Mark Todd back on form

The CIC*** 8/9yr old competition proved to be very exciting with the win going to New Zealand's Mark Todd riding NZB Land Vision, a horse he believes is one of the best he's ever had; a great accolade from such a legendary horseman. He has his sights set firmly on the London 2012 Olympics. For the meantime, Land Vision's next competition will be at Boekelo in mid October after Mark returns from WEG. Mark's ride on NZB Mouse in the CCI*** cross country on Saturday helped him: “Yesterday I lost time coming into the arena and at the water, so today I made sure I was fast into and out of the arena and at the water. With these CICs you can't start steady and hope to make up time later on - as I jumped the Footbridge (Fence 16) they gave Sarah Cohen's time out over the tannoy which I heard, and I knew I had to move on.”

Dressage leader Ruth Edge finished in fourth on Applejack II, only dropping down the order after picking up 6.4 time penalties cross country.

This CIC*** 8/9yo class is proving to be an excellent showcase for future Olympic talent which is good news for team selectors with six British riders in the top ten placings.

Influential

The cross country phase of this year's Blenheim proved to be a very influential element of the event. Of the 84 starters, 53 went clear, only seven of which were inside the time. With just ten penalties separating the top 25 riders in the CCI***, there was a lot to play for, encouraging riders to take the direct routes in order to stay in with a chance. The challenging course designed by Eric Winter and built by David Evans (who also built courses at the Sydney and Beijing Olympics) consisted of 30 fences (42 jumping efforts) on undulating ground. Surprisingly only a handful finished inside the time of 10mins 56secs round the 6,230m track. Problems on the course were evenly spread with penalties recorded over 15 obstacles with fences six and 27 the most influential.