First Brit off to a good start at Kentucky: ‘He’s a gangly young horse – but he’s as good a cross-country horse as I’ve ever sat on’

Britain’s Harry Meade was pleased with his Defender Kentucky Three-Day Event dressage test this afternoon on Et Hop Du Matz, who put in a pleasingly mistake-free performance.

The 11-year-old, owned by Mandy Gray and Harry, scored 34.2 for 10th overnight in the five-star.

“He’s a lovely, young, gangly, very long horse, who’s a little bit like a spider, and I was really thrilled of him,” said Harry.

“He tried really hard, he worked really hard. He didn’t make a single mistake in any of the movements. He was in a much more uphill balance, which from a strength point of view has taken him really quite a long time to be able to start to work towards, not that it’s in any way a finished product yet.

“I’d say the weaknesses were just into and out of movements. You still get that slight discombobulation and he’s not rock solid yet. That’s where he would have lost marks and as a result sat on six and a halves and sevens.

“Looking at the bigger picture, he’s a really game, kind young horse who I think tried really hard, didn’t really put a foot wrong and would have very much had a positive experience in there. He came out like he was just working at home and that’s a big part of his journey.

“Obviously we want to try and get the best performance out of him this week, but also it’s seeing this week in the context of his longer career.”

Et Hop Du Matz was produced in France by amateur rider Mathieu Chombart, joining Harry in 2022.

“He’d done a lovely job, in no way giving him any bad experiences, riding him in quite a free, nice, open way. You’d quite like to inherit a horse from someone like that, rather than someone who’s over dominated them,” said Harry Meade after his Kentucky Three-Day Event dressage.

The pair won Millstreet CCI3*-L have been 18th and ninth at Blenheim Horse Trials and Bramham Horse Trials CCI4*-Ls. Harry then fell off on Et Hop Du Matz’s five-star debut at Maryland 5 Star last autumn.

“But I’d say he’s as good a cross-country horse as I’ve ever sat on,” said Harry. “He’s very athletic. He’s really rangy, but within that he’s very nimble. He can add short strides and he can stand off a mile, so you’ve got a huge amount of range and choice

“But the biggest thing about him is when he’s going cross country, he lobs in his mind, so even though he’s going fast, his brain is almost quite slow in a good way – he’s the opposite of a horse who’s addled in his brain and a bit hectic and so it’s almost like everything’s in slow motion.

“So I hope he’ll be a really good horse and I hope I can just try and give him the best chance.”

Harry also starts on the former William Fox-Pitt ride Grafennacht here at Kentucky and they do their dressage at 3.26pm local time (8.26pm British time) tomorrow.

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