Kurten stars at Aachen

By Michael Slavin

Although this year the Irish team was excluded from sending a side to the great show jumping festival at Aachen, due to our not being part of the Super League, two individuals - Cameron Hanley and Jessica Kurten - represented us there. Jessica, who has now climbed back to fifth place in the world rankings, had the best of the pair as she scored a win, a second, a third and two fourths to earn in the region of €39,999. On the opening day she and Quibel were second in a jump-off. The following day she had back-to-back fourths with Maike and Vivaldo.

On Saturday, she and Quibel came through to win ahead of home hero Ludger Beerbaum and netted a prize of €16,500. She then went on to be third in the hunter class with Vivaldo behind Swiss star Marcus Fuchs. She qualified for the grand prix but had to be content with 15th in that rich event. Meantime, both Tom Davin and Dave Quigley got into the prizes at San Sabastian in Spain. The Irish Nations Cup squad gets back into action next week at the big five-star event in Falsterbo, Sweden, where a good haul of points would come close to ensuring our promotion to the Super League.