Emanuele Gaudiano Wins Opening Class at CHIO Aachen 2016

Emanuele Gaudiano & Kentucky VH Neerhof Z

Italy’s Emanuele Gaudiano won the opening class of CHIO Aachen, Germany on Tuesday, July 12th, 2016, claiming first place in the STAWAG Prize CHIO5*.

Gaudiano was aboard new mount Kentucky VH Neerhof Z, an 11-year-old Zangersheide gelding (Kashir Van Schuttershof x Karsten) that he has only been competing since May of this year.

Most of the entries on the 52-horse entry list used the class as a slow, warmup familiarization round in the vast Aachen arena. It’s going to be a big week of competition for these top-ranked horses, with the FEI Nations Cup taking center stage on Thursday, and the massive Rolex Grand Prix of Aachen, part of the Rolex Grand Slam of Show Jumping, culminating the week on Sunday afternoon.

So it was no shocker that the naturally-fast Gaudiano scored his win by approaching the class with a different objective: to test the speed of his new horse in one of the most demanding environments in the sport.

Kentucky VH Neerhof Z, who was previously ridden by Ben Beevers of Belgium, stepped right up and clocked a winning time of 63.23 seconds in the single round class.

In 2nd place and the next-fastest finisher was Maurice Tebbel of Germany, who rode Camilla PJ, a 9-year-old Hannoverian mare (Calme x Picard) through the timers in 66.95 seconds. Willem Greve of the Netherlands was 3rd with the 9-year-old KWPN stallion Carrera (Larino x Contender).

With 22 riders completing faultless rounds and an additional nine picking up only time faults, it was more than evident that quality is present in spades for the week’s competition. Things pick up again on Wednesday, with the first of three international jumping classes kicking off at 11:00am local time.

See the complete result list of the STAWAG Prize at this link.