Today was the last day of the CPEDI hosted by Sydney International Three-Day event, which culminated with the Freestyle competition.

The indoor arena at Sydney International Equestrian Centre was filled with music this morning as the final day of competition opened the day’s event.

This was the first of the International qualifying events for Australian based riders campaigning for Tokyo 2020 Paralympic Games, and was the first FEI qualifying event in the Oceania region that will count towards a team ranking on the FEI Paralympic Ranking List.

The Australian team at the event consisted of Matilda Davies (Grade IV), Victoria Davies (Grade II) and Sarah Sherwood (Grade IV) with the team posting a score of 388.764, which will count towards Australia’s Paralympic team ranking.

The winners of the Freestyle competition were:

Grade II: Victoria Davies & Celere on 68.33%

Grade IV: Tilda Carnegie & Devils Chocolate on 66.13%

“She felt incredible, she had all this energy and the music just seemed to pick her up and she almost grew a foot taller and went to power on. I have loved the event and it has been such an incredible opportunity to be able to compete under international judges and thank you to the organisers, the eventers, for having us here, and to [High Performance], all the stewards and officials for allowing this event to occur” said Matilda of her win this morning.

“I am hoping long term to make it to Tokyo on her, short term I just want to keep on building on our marks and also continue on our work in Prix St Georges and improving on that” she added.

The overall Champions of the event were:

Grade II: Victoria Davies & Celere

Grade IV: Zoe Vorenas & Neversfelde Kipling

Equestrian Australia High Performance Sports Coordinator, Stefanie Maraun, who assists with the management of the Para Program said “it was wonderful to have riders from four states attend the Sydney CPEDI in conjunction with the Sydney 3DE. We have some wonderful combinations in the mix at the moment and it is really exciting to see these combinations improve at each event.

We have six more qualifying events to go and I am sure the standard is going to get better and better! The riders were full of praise for the event and I would like to thank the Sydney Eventing Committee for their inclusion and we hope to be back in 2020!” The next event, which will give riders the opportunity to gain a qualifying score of 62%, is Brisbane CDI on 17-21 July 2019.