Wellington, Fla. – Feb. 17, 2017 – Pedro Junqueira Muylaert of Brazil topped a four-horse jump-off to win Friday night’s $130,000 Grand Prix CSI3*, going double-clear on Prince Royal Z MFS, owned by Stenio da Silva. The victory was a great surprise to Mylaert as he recently acquired the 10-year-old Zangersheid stallion.
“Prince is a new horse for me; I bought him one month ago. This is our first week of the WEF season so I’m very happy with him,” said Muylaert. “My plan for the jump-off was not very strict since there were not many people who made it past the first round. I just wanted to go clear. I did not imagine that we would win tonight.”
Only four entries made it back to the jump-off out of the original starting field of 44 in the Global Arena at Equestrian Village. Many horse-and-rider combinations had rails in the first round and a few chose to retire rather than complete the challenging Richard Jeffery-designed course.
Paul O’Shea of Ireland set the standard on Skara Glen’s Machu Picchu going clear in a time of 37.59 seconds. Their lead was short lived, however, as Muylaert followed him in the order and beat his time by half a second, stopping the timers at 37.27 seconds. O’Shea thought he let the victory slip through his fingers going a little too slow early on in the course.
“I tried to go fast even though it wasn’t fast enough. I could have been quicker to the second fence but I did what I could,” said O’Shea. “I jumped the grand prix here two or three weeks ago and we ended up ninth with a single time fault, and in the last grand prix we were fifth. He hasn’t had a single rail this year and we are really pleased so far.”
Jimmy Torano, was on track to take over the lead on Day Dream, owned by Jimmy and Danielle Torano, but had a rail at the second to last fence to finish third. Hardin Towell made a valiant effort on New York, owned by Evergate Stable, LLC, landing in fourth place with 12 faults.
RESULTS
$130,000 Grand Prix CSI3*
Place / Rider / Country / Horse / R1 Faults / R2 Faults | Time
1. Pedro Junqueira Muylaert / BRA / Prince Royal Z MFS / 0 / 0 | 37.27
2. Paul O’Shea / IRL / Skara Glen’s Machu Picchu / 0 / 0 | 37.59
3. Jimmy Torano / USA / Day Dream / 0 / 4 | 36.94
4. Hardin Towell / USA / New York / 0 / 12 | 37.12
5. Samuel Parot / CHI / Atlantis / 4 | 71.00
6. Jessica Mendoza / GBR / Toy Boy / 4 | 75.74
7. Santiago Lambre / MEX / Aymara des Bergeries / 4 | 77.66
8. Capt. Brian Cournane / IRL / Javas Keltic Mist / 4 | 78.08