Entry fee a huge incentive to finish

Manawatu Standard

RIDING HIGH: Lucy and her 11-year-old gelding, Tinapai.

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Riders do not enter the main event at the Horse-of-the-Year Show in Hastings on a whim, not when the entry fee is $3800 per horse.

That is what the Akers from Opiki must pay when 25-year-old Lucy and her 11-year-old gelding, Tinapai, compete in the select field of 30 next week.

First up is $700 for nominating the duo and those who finish get $3400 back. The event carries $200,000 in prizemoney with $40,000 for first place.

Akers will also compete in the lady rider-of-the-year event at Hastings before returning to train in Florida with New Zealand Olympic showjumper, Sharne Wordley, her second winter there.

The Akers bought a 10-year-old bay gelding, Brother Brown, from Dannevirke's Doug Isaacson seven weeks ago and Chloe Akers, 21, will contest three events at Hastings, including the under-21 young-rider category.

Last year she was training 12 horses a day in Brisbane for the Youth Olympics in Singapore when she had a serious fall and had to return home.

"My hip popped out and I have had to cut down my riding a lot," she said.

After she finishes riding there is still pain, but she ploughs on and is also a studying to be a teacher.

She and Newbury's Helen Bruce, 21, a Massey University student, are in the New Zealand Young Rider showjumping team to take on the Australians at Hastings.

Bruce was also in the winning Young Rider eventing team in Australia last year while Akers is in the showjumping team for the third year.

Bruce, with Dark Magic, is fourth in the national Toyota Young Rider Series, while Halcombe's Jaimee Gowler, 18, lies fifth on her 10-year-old mare, Text Me Back. Chloe Akers is ninth, but she had two months away in Queensland.

Gowler is a former Nga Tawa school student who won the Taupo 3-star young-rider class in December.

Master showjumper Maurice Beatson has a short trip from his Dannevirke farm with nine horses for the big week of the year. He has won the main title four times and will have three horses in the main event: My Gollywog, Jedi Warrior and Zibbibo.

That will probably be their last outing in New Zealand because they will be among the six he's taking to sell in the United States in a month. Beatson says he will have young horses ready to take the jump up next season.

Isaacson will campaign Major Brown, Brother Brown's brother, at Hastings.

- © Fairfax NZ News