Tsetserleg - Badminton Cross Country - 2024

Stumps. He's doing a great job.

Now Boyd Martin sets a leg. Tsf. Boyd Martin, who posted a solid dressage test and he's right there among the leading contenders to take this title.

Really exciting to have Boyd over here. Boyd, 44 years old and this tetzelage is 17 as well. So hugely experienced. He is trying Boyd to complete every five star in the world. And Babington is the one that he really needs under his belt.

And when you consider that one of them is in Adelaide, it's not an easy thing to accomplish.

Absolutely not. Horses do travel very, very well, but obviously there's expense involved, as you can imagine. And if you've got the support team behind you to allow you to try and achieve that, it must be some amazing feeling.

Set to leg is 17 now, but no back number on recent evidence.

Not at all. Whoa. He absolutely committed to that. He totally trusted Tetzeleg that he was going to be sharp with his front horses, really full of galloping. And for Tom as well. The horse is not tired. And we hit Tatzelek into the Huntsman's close. Boyd, hold. Whoa. That was really close. He was very close. I. I think he's fine. He has knocked the flag down. He did go the clips because I should think he could just be a little bit down on the clock. Boys coming into. Into the lake, go on a little bit more of an angle. So he gets one extra stride in the water to then ride forward to that. Yeah, really well ridden. It was a decision whether to make a turn. Here we go. He's got straight. You can see he's slightly angled. That's a relatively small fence. It's about a meter 15, meter 20. But to land on grass is a luxury at this level, so you've got the chance to make a turn. As you can see, he's holding on to his left rein to make it really clear. He was very accurate. Land and drive forward up to this narrow fence. But keeping hold of the rein so the horse knows exactly where it needs to be.

Go.

All right. Back with Boyd Martin and sets a leg.

The half bridge. Absolutely fly it. It's a. It's a. It's a rider spectator frightener. The horses don't really notice it. They run up the ramp and you just get that lovely feeling of air as you're flying through it. And you're meant to smile.

I like Eric Winter, the course designer's notes to competitors, where he said, just keep kicking.

Absolutely. And here, coming into the eyelashes, you got to keep up the Pace, it wouldn't be normally how you'd ride a coffin. And he kept across there, got the glockies ticking. But this is Will's opportunity to really show the selectors in the world that he's a world class rider.

Lloyd Martin sets a leg.

They've come up quite a slope up to this fence. So you can see Boyd just saying, listen to me, that's quite an airy sort of rail drops down. No, he's going to go long because he didn't shorten his reins quick enough to have the control to ask him to jump that log. So again, time wasting. Turning the horse away probably wastes about five seconds, but there is. And yeah, that's lovely. Will giving him a hug. He's proud of what he's done.

That's not lovely. That was a surprise for Void Martin and sets a leg at the sunken

road that I wouldn't have expected for this combination. He's now going to take the longer route going in, but I think that's a leg again. Just looks a little bit flat, a little bit tired. Boyd is having to work a lot harder than you would expect. And the fact he's now going to be doing this really long route, very energy sapping. It'd be very interesting to see where he goes from here because. Because he has got a long way to go from here. He's going down now to hope that when he runs downhill after these silver birch rails that he'll be hoping that Tetsulake just fills his lungs with a little bit more air and then gets another run on to jump these big ditches. And Boyd is so experienced that he knows that horses can come what we say, on and off the bridle. That means one minute they're taking you, next minute they take a few breaths and then they're taking you again.

And.

And that's an experience that you gain with the more horses you ride.

And again, it's interesting gauge of just how this is going to play out today because he's such a little coiled spring of a horse, this, Even though he's 17 years old, that you'd expect him to be taking you, wouldn't you?

Yes. But as you can just see then, you know, he looked a bit flat going through a few fences ago and then he's just picked up again. So Boyd will be like, oh, phew, you know, he's back with me again. Let's just keep going. He's, you know, as a rider you've got to, to feel how your horse is and if it's unusual that they're not being their normal self. Yes. And I would have thought his plan A would have been to have gone straight, but as he landed, he landed a little bit short. The horse is a bit flat. Boyd's reins have got a little bit long. He's having to go long. So again,

Boyd over this and as he heads out into the country, we'll join Claire.

It's their very different horses and Dreamer has a much big. He's got an amazing big gallop. The other horse will have a smaller stride and need a little bit more looking after. Dreamer found that vicarage ditch area quite hard work because it's twisty and actually it's quite up and down and that's where I lost a lot of my time. So maybe the other horse would be a bit quicker there, but I'm going to go and watch a few and come up with a pretty different plan for him.

Okay, and you think may be quicker.

He wouldn't have the gallop. So maybe I'll know a bit more about the course. To be honest, I got nervous last night. There was quite a heated rider meeting and the ground jury were worried about tired horses. And I had a great round of him at Blenheim last year. But I just thought don't, you know, don't knock him out completely. He's done one other five star with Oliver Tannen. He was tired after that, so, you know, maybe I could have taken a bit more risks. But we'll come back and do that again another year.

Tom, thank you. That's been one of the best rider interviews I've ever done.

Thank you very much.

Claire Boulding. Making dreams come true down in the collecting area. What a nice chap.

He is a lovely, lovely man. And I saw him when we were walking the course before and we discussed a few of the fences. I'm so thrilled for him. That will have made his day.

Claire, avoid Martin. It'll be disappointment for him and sets a leg.

But they finish, he will definitely be very disappointed. But he had a very bitty sort of round. You know, one minute the horse was going, but, you know, he's actually finished a lot better than what he looked. At one point I was thinking, gosh, Boyd might have to be pulling him up. But it just shows he knows his horse. He knows that his horse has got guts and determination and the horse really dug deep there. I think he had to work a lot harder than Boyd had thought he had. And as you can see, he's happily trotting along.