Reigning Olympic champions Christian Kukuk and Checker 47 came to London on “firey” form and celebrated the anniversary of their Paris triumph with a victory in the €165,000 Longines Global Champions Tour grand prix on Sunday 10 August.
Hopes of a seventh British win were soaring when Ben Maher laid down a poetically fluid round on Point Break, that axed an intimidating 6sec from the leading clear, from Belgian’s Niels Bruynseels (Chacco’s Lando OL).
But while Ben’s round was like mercury poured down a maze, Christian’s scythed the lines with mathematical precision, and the great 15-year-old grey used his awesome scope to come home with 0.38sec in hand.
“Now I see the playback [see video below], it was probably a once-in-a-lifetime jump off,” Christian said. “I turned to the third last vertical and the moment I decided to do it, I told myself for a second ‘you can’t’. I was on so much of an angle, the way he jumped it — I think of all the horses in the world, only Checker could deal with this situation. And it’s where I won the jump off no question.
“He’s naturally a quick horse but the round from Ben was so fast, I knew it had to be the round of a lifetime today to beat him.”
Christian Kukuk:“Emotionally, it was a rough few weeks”
The win came a week after Christian announced a new chapter in his career, setting up on his own after 13 years based with Ludger Beerbaum.
“Emotionally, it was a rough few weeks,” he said.
Ben had his own gremlins to wrestle with, having taken some risk strategies that didn’t come to fruition with Charlotte Rossetter and Pamela Wright’s 11-year-old, including in this year’s Rolex grand prix at Royal Windsor.
“I knew I’d messed up a couple of jump-offs on him trying to do things that perhaps weren’t playing to my strengths, so I knew I had to take a lot of risks today but it was calculated risk,” he said.
“If I try to push him out of his rhythm he doesn’t like it at the moment but I think it will come a bit later. Luckily he’s like a rubber ball, and he can turn, so I try to play to his strengths.”
His round was near perfection — and could have been unbeatable, had it not been for a heavy slip after the second fence.
“I don’t say it very often, but as a rider I don’t think I could have done anything differently,” he said. “When I turned back, I saw one less stride to the double but as I went to step away he lost his footing behind, which was quite significant, having watched the replay.
“I had to alter the line and jog out to the right hand side, which was time consuming but I don’t think it was jumpable on what I was committed to before the slip.”
Last year’s victors in the Longines Global Champions Tour of London, Harry Charles and Sherlock were the only other Brits to join Ben in the jump-off, and they tipped the penultimate oxer, crossing the line more than 4sec behind the winning pace for ninth.
You can read the full report from the Longines Global Champions Tour of London in next week’s Horse & Hound magazine, in the shops Thursday 14 August.
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