Iceland Wins Gold in T1

Favorite Jóhann Rúnar Skúlason on Hnokki frá Fellskot did not disappoint in the tough T1 (tölt with speed changes) and won the gold yesterday, ending the 2013 World Championships for Icelandic Horses in Berlin on a victorious note for Iceland.

Archive photo by Geir Ólafsson/Iceland Review.

The venue in Karlshorst resembled a Roman arena when the riders entered the track yesterday. It was obvious that this would be a finale of equals. And that in the end fast tölt would decide the championship.

Except for a few exceptions in a positive as well as a negative sense, the judges were relatively united.

In Anne Stine Haugen’s presentation of Muni frá Kvistum there were few differences to the preliminary show. Isabelle Felsum’s impressive black stallion Victor frá Diisa produced lots of saliva, although the monitor revealed that it rider also gave reins. Hinrik Bragason’s horse Smyrill frá Hrísum ran like clockwork throughout the test.

Hinrik Bragason on Smyrill frá Hrísum. Photo: Henk Peterse.

Moli frá Skriðu, ridden by Nils Christian Larsen, presented itself with creeping hindquarters like a Tennessee Walking Horse. The question must be raised whether such a collection in slow tölt is according to the Icelandic horse’s conformation.

Judge Carina Heller seemed to have been the only one to see the buckling in the curves, because she gave it an unusually low score, 7.5 points.

Especially in the curves many horses showed weaknesses or beat faults (click here to read a critical expert commentary about slow tölt).

Karly Zingsheim showed Dagur in a flawless performance, judging by how it was ridden in the curves and the position of the hindquarters in the downward transitions.

During the walk intervals Zingsheim was the only one to give long reins. For Dagur, which has a tendency to go behind the bit, this was certainly a relief.

Karly Zingsheim on Dagur. Photo: Henk Peterse.

The third task, fast tölt, made the decision. In anticipation of high scores, the speed of most riders was far too high. The horses were close to going wild, running with open mouths; many of them lost balance in the curves and had to be corrected. Moli frá Skriðu almost rolled over in the curve. Beauty was unfortunately hard to find in this task.

Favorite Jóhann Rúnar Skúlason seemed to have anticipated this development. He controlled the speed of his stallion Hnokki frá Fellskot very accurately. He rode not as fast as the others, but flawlessly and without any faults in the curves.

With good reason the judges gave him a score of 10.0 for this task. The test’s trophy, the tölt-horn, will be in Jóhann’s house until the next world cup.

Karly Zingsheim’s Dagur also made the curves reliably and placed second.

Here are the results, compiled by isibless.de:

01: 013 Jóhann R. Skúlason [WC] [IS] – Hnokki frá Fellskoti [IS2003188470] 9.61

SLOW 9.5 – 9.5 – 8.5 – 9.0 – 9.5 = 9.33

LENG 9.0 – 9.5 – 9.5 – 9.5 – 9.5 = 9.50

FAST 10.0 – 10.0 – 10.0 – 9.0 – 10.0 = 10.00

02: 186 Karly Zingsheim [DE] – Dagur [DE2001143741] 8.33

SLOW 8.0 – 8.5 – 8.5 – 8.5 – 8.0 = 8.33

LENG 8.0 – 8.5 – 8.5 – 8.0 – 8.0 = 8.17

FAST 8.5 – 9.0 – 8.5 – 8.5 – 8.0 = 8.50

03: 123 Anne Stine Haugen [WC] [NO] – Muni frá Kvistum [IS2003181964] 8.28

SLOW 8.5 – 9.0 – 9.0 – 8.5 – 8.5 = 8.67