Ottawa, Ontario—Three-time Canadian Olympian Ashley Holzer of Toronto, ON, finished in fourth place in the Grand Prix Freestyle on January 30 with her 2008 Olympic mount, Pop Art, at the $130,000 Exquis World Dressage Masters, held January 29–31 at the Palm Beach International Equestrian Center, in Wellington, FL, USA.
Holzer and Pop Art (Amsterdam x Cabochon), a 12-year-old Dutch Warmblood gelding owned by Rusty Holzer and Ian and Moreen Nicoll, earned an excellent score of 76.350% in the Grand Prix Freestyle. In the overall scores, the duo was awarded marks that had them tied for second (American judge Liselotte Fore) and third (American judge Janet Foy) from two members of the panel. For the second day in a row they bettered the score they posted in the Freestyle a week ago at the Gold Coast Opener where they were awarded a 76.250%.
“I’m very happy with my freestyle. I unfortunately made a few little rider mistakes tonight but I was extremely pleased with Poppy’s consistent strong effort, especially in his piaffe and passage tour,” remarked Holzer, who rode to music from Disney’s Millennium Celebration and the film National Treasure for her Freestyle. “Many people even commented on the big improvement since Hong Kong.”
First place went to the reigning Olympic gold medalist Anky van Grunsven of the Netherlands, who earned a score of 79.600% % on IPS Painted Black. Hans-Peter Minderhoud, also of the Netherlands, and Exquis Escapado finished in second with 76.600%. The third spot was awarded to American Olympian Steffen Peters and his Olympic mount Ravel with a score of 77.750%.
Complete results for the Exquis World Dressage Masters may be found at http://www.palmbeachworlddressagemasters.com/scores.html.
The international judging panel including Stephen Clarke (FEI O—GBR), Wim Ernes (FEI O—NED), Evi Eisenhardt (FEI O—GER), Janet Foy (FEI I—US) Liselotte Fore (FEI I—USA), and Sarah Geikie (FEI C—USA).
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