Beware the Rides of March: Piggy Takes First Four-Star of 2022 at Thoresby

The first CCI4*-S of the British season is always an excellent early indicator of form ahead of Badminton, and though this year’s fixture took place at a new venue – Nottinghamshire’s grand Thoresby Spring Carnival of Eventing, rather than the nearby Belton House that ran its last in 2019 – the competition felt like a familiar jumping off point for a typically top-class field of athletes.

106 combinations came forward to deliver a first-phase performance over the last few days, representing a cross-section of some of Britain’s top horsepower and brightest up-and-coming talent, and 94 of those would opt to leave the start box in today’s action-packed finale. Like Belton before it, Thoresby’s season-opening four-star was built with five-star preparation in mind – but unlike Belton, the Thoresby estate has a much smaller swathe of land to work with. While Belton’s capacious grounds allowed for a run-and-jump pipe opener to get the season going, Thoresby delivered a tighter, more technical track, which required focus and control to get the best of. Time, too, was predictably tough, with just five combinations coming home inside the 6.29 optimum – a challenge, inarguably, for this early stage of the year, but one that provided a necessary wake-up call after a long winter off games.

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*Article written by: Tilly Berendt *