Price Giving Ceremony CCI4S. Photo: Annette Doelger
With Ero de Cantraie Julia Krajewski (GER) stayed clear in the show-jumping phase,thus winning the CCI4*-S Meßmer Trophy (30.6) and the German Championship. Christoph Wahler (GER) was runner-up with D’Accord (34.4). Third place went to Julia Krajewski and her second horse Nickel (36.3). Anna Lena Schaaf (GER) and Fairytale (37.8) won the bronze medal.
Olympic gold medalist Julia Krajewski crowned her successful weekendwith the four-star win. In the prize-giving ceremony she thanked the audience for the great atmosphere: “All of you make the victory so special.Ero really seems to like the atmosphere here. Huge praise to the organisers – the conditions here are absolutely perfect. Luhmühlen is our favourite event – everyone is so incredibly friendly and professional at the same time and the horses feel really comfortable here.”
Before their jumping round, the German Champion was still in the lead with Nickel, but they had two unfortunate rails, which left them finishing in third. She had already competed her ultimately winning horse in the first half of the show-jumping and had thus secured her victory early on: “It was somehow surreal, to know that I’d won the title so early on. I could only have beat myself to it. All in all, I am overjoyed with the way the week went and incredibly proud of myyoung horses. I really didn’t expect to be on the podium with both horses at the end of the week. Ero’sdevelopment in the last 12 months is absolutely amazing and Nickel was a bit unlucky today. He too would havedeserved the win today.”
Christoph Wahler had worked his way up the ranks: “The week didn’t start out so well But he’s so great in the cross-country phase, a naturally quick horse with a huge gallop. Every round I ride him he gets a little bit more comfortablewith going faster so we were able to move up a couple of ranks. The clear round today put us right up there.”
Anna Lena Schaaf was very emotional after the end of the competition and was at a loss for words: “This horse just
Julia Krajewski with Ero de Cantraie. Photo: Irish Eventing Times
leaves me speechless. She means so much to me. The show-jumping was very challenging today and I’m so glad that we stayed clear.”
Julia Krajewski explained Anna Lena Schaaf’s emotion with the strong bond between horse and rider: “In my opinion, the bond between a horse and its rider can be even stronger than interpersonal relationships. We do everything for our horses – it is incredibly touching when they trust us and go above and beyond.”
Results: www.luhmuehlen.de
