It all came together perfectly this Saturday afternoon at Horses & Dreams meets the Royal Kingdom of Jordan in Hagen: Sunshine, sport and great atmosphere. Spectator ranks were packed and a highly competitive field provided great excitement until the last round in the Prize of LVM Insurance, the qualification event for tomorrow’s Grand Prix.

Fourteen combinations had qualified for the jump-off. The 2015 German National Champion Denis Nielsen sat in the hot seat for a long time, riding his top horse Cashmoaker DSP (Calido I x Lafitte). But then Katrin Eckermann and her nine-year-old mare Caleya (Calido I x Lancer II) came along and shaved off two seconds of his time.

The 27-year-old summed up her ride, “I’m riding the mare since March, but she’s no stranger to me. My father had her since she was four and trained her, and it is amazing to keep the win in the family.”

The winning pair will go on to the Nations Cup event in Linz next. Second place went to Markus Beerbaum, winner of the 2017 DKB-Riders Tour, and his mount is a family horse too – Charmed 2 (Chacco-Blue x Plural) is owned by Beerbaum’s daughter Brianne. Beerbaum smiled: “She, Brianne, was pretty nervous today, but she kept her fingers crossed and was stoked with the result.”

Whilst Eckermann and Beerbaum will ride different horses on Sunday in the Grand Prix of Deutsche Kreditbank AG, which is also the first event of the DKB-Riders Tour series, Nielsen will again rely on Cashmoaker DSP: “He’s super fit and fresh, and I believe we can attack again tomorrow.”