Rodrigo Pessoa wins Estoril opener

Rodrigo Pessoa and Palouchin de
Ligny. By Stefano Grasso/GCT

Brazil's Rodrigo Pessoa claimed the first of the five-star classes, a 1.45m speed competition, at the Global Champions Tour's Portuguese leg in Estoril.

The course was set by German designer Frank Rothenberger, utilising the entire space of the large turf arena. It required horses to take big strides and travel at a quick pace. And the final fence, a wall, caught quite a few out.

The early bird
It was the early riders in the class who set the pace and it couldn't be beaten by the tail end of the 41 starters. Germany's Philipp Weishaupt, first to go, set a tidy time of 57.59 seconds with the Landor S bred stallion Leoville 2 to rest eventually in third place. Britain's Ben Maher was second out with Rowena Gredley’s Voske. They were almost four seconds quicker (53.78), which was good enough for second place by the conclusion of the class.

Runners up Ben Maher and Voske.
By Stefano Grasso/GCT

Rodrigo, out on course six horses after Ben with Double H Farm’s Palouchin De Ligny, found even more time to pinch and after he finished in 51.42 seconds, the top three were not touched.

"He is a very competitive horse when everything goes right," said Rodrigo of the homebred horse that has the blood of Baloubet du Rouet and Chin Chin. "He is very fast and careful so I can always keep pushing on course.
"The ride today was great and I had a good feeling with him after the first two fences that I could go fast. He doesn’t like to go slow, so these type of classes suit him very well and he can be very competitive."


For results from the show, click here