Bubby Upton and Cola. Photo by Sophie Robins/Girl In The Field.
Say what you will about a Thursday morning at MARS Badminton (and boy, do the riders: “I don’t think the judges have woken up yet,” sniffed one, who will remain anonymous to protect the grumpy), but we here at EN relish them. The calm, the relative quiet, the steady trickle of 34s that roll on in and make us feel firmly in our seats and not on the edge of them – and then, of course, the standout test or two that shakes us up a bit and reminds us of just how much competition there is to come. It’s a single-espresso cup of coffee for the soul, and that’s the last time we’ll say that about this competition for the rest of the week, frankly, because now it’s Thursday lunchtime and the first hint of cross-country butterflies just universally kicked in for everyone on site, a bit like that time a government alert was scheduled on all our phones part-way into Burghley.
Our clubhouse leader, and queen of the Badminton Coffee Morning, comes as no surprise: Bubby Upton and her stalwart Cola find themselves best of the bunch on a smart 29.8 to take an early lead – and the accolade of being the only sub-30 partnership so far.
This is the pair’s fifth time cracking the 30 barrier at this level, though even Bubby wondered for a moment if she’d actually manage it today.
“He was really good, but I would say he was on the on the edge of being too fresh, which is a bit how he’s been all year,” says Bubby with a laugh. “But I’m really pleased with him; we managed to navigate our way through. I wouldn’t say it was a perfect, polished test, but with him being more established at the level now, and him being such a beautiful horse, he has such a natural presence.”
At sixteen, Cola has physically levelled up – not just in his work, but in changes to his management at home that Bubby and her team have worked scrupulously to make.
“He looks a million dollars, thanks to my team at home. Feeding-wise, it’s very difficult with him because he’s very, very fussy eater, and I think past few years, he probably would have looked a bit like too lean at times, whereas now with Saracen, we’ve really got his diet to a T. I feel like he’s come in in the best shape possible and we’re able to have him a bit heavier than normal.”
Still, each day is a fact-finding mission.
“He’s actually getting stronger and stronger as he gets older, and we’re kind of now reaching his best work in the last couple of years,” she says. “So his warm up is very, very short. He has about 15 minutes, and I actually felt like today I probably needed five minutes more. So we went in a little bit on eggshells.
“I just rode my first couple of movements very quiet, just to ease him into it,” she continues. “And then he felt like he kind of got into the groove, particularly after the walk. He really relaxed in the walk, and then I felt the canter was very good. It’s so hard because it’s forever changing, but I guess fundamentally, his mindset doesn’t change – like, he often goes in there and it’s exactly the same how he is out there [in the warm-up], but out there he was a bit fresh.”
Georgie Goss and Feloupe. Photo by Sophie Robins/Girl In The Field.
Ireland’s Georgie Goss and Feloupe take an early second place, though their 30.8 was a couple of marks off of Georgie’s aim for the ordinarily very consistent mare.
“I’m delighted with the test – I’m just a bit annoyed with myself,” she says. “She never misses the changes, and I missed that first change. She’s normally bang-on, so I’m a little bit disappointed – I’d been hoping for more like a 27 or 28. But the judges never give marks away on a Thursday, so overall, I’m pleased.”
“She’s very consistent on the flat; she always goes in and does the exact same test at every single event,” she continues. “You get the odd judge who loves her and the other one doesn’t, but generally, she’s always sat in the in the higher scores.”
That consistency still shows through even with the mistake: the pair scored a 29.6 here last year and a 30.6 in 2024. That reliability has helped Georgie – who once again comes to this event with a custom manicure for ‘Lulu Lemon’ – find the joy in the first phase.
“Certainly for me, dressage is not my strong suit,” she says. “I’m much more for the jumping phases. So to be sat on a horse like her, where everything you put into her, you get out of her, is brilliant. She’s never going to blow; she’s never going to get tense. I always try and get in the arena early, so I get the applause from the horse before to just lift her a little bit more. But no, she’s so consistent – she’s a joy to ride.”
Last year, the pair sealed the deal on a remarkable accomplishment – one that demonstrates the consistency that Georgie herself brings to the pivotal cross-country phase.
“Sam [Watson of EquiRatings] reminded me before cross-country last year that I’d be the first rider ever to have ten completions out of ten starts. I was like, ‘great, Sam, you’ve guaranteed me to fall off!’,” she laughs. “So to have ticked that box is amazing. I’ve had some very, very special horses over the last few years – let’s hope we can make it 11!”
Sarah Bullimore and Corimiro. Photo by Sophie Robins/Girl In The Field.
Sarah Bullimore and the ten-year-old homebred Corimiro (another son of her former championship ride, Lilly Corinne) came into today as a pair who could well have taken the first-phase lead, despite the gelding’s inexperience – they put a 24.8 on the board at the level below when finished third at last year’s eight- and nine-year-old championship at Blenheim, and impressed with a solid 30 en route to fifth in the horse’s five-star debut at Pau last season.
But like Georgie and Feloupe before them, they found themselves scrambling slightly for marks in the flying changes, a particularly expensive part of the test and one that usually plays in their favour. First, they threw in an extra and unwarranted one in the medium canter, netting them 4s across the board, and then the first two of four changes weren’t quite the complete picture, giving them just-above-mid-table marks from all three judges. Though they presented a better change in each direction for the final two, that smattering of lower numbers pulled an otherwise very sweet test down to a 32.1 – still plenty respectable, but a touch frustrating.
“I am,” Sarah admits, “a little disappointed, really. I feel like I let him down. His trot work was lovely, but his changes are his highlight, and they just weren’t quite on the button today.”
But, she concedes, “it’s easy to forget he’s only ten, and it’s his first Badminton. The atmosphere is like nothing he’s ever seen before – he’s seen some big atmospheres, but nothing like this. You can’t replicate it. It’s something different; it’s another step up. But he loves the crowd – as he came out of the ring he stopped at A while everyone was applauding and looked around like, ‘ahh, it’s all for me!’ Perhaps today he loved it a little too much, and we just didn’t quite find ourself on the same page with the changes.”
Tom Jackson and United 36. Photo by Sophie Robins/Girl In The Field.
It’s becoming more and more unusual to see five-star first-timers at Badminton and Burghley, but for Tom Jackson, it was a path that just made sense with the ten-year-old United 36.
“Well,” he laughs, “we’ll see if it was the right decision at the end of the week! But he’s always been a very good cross-country horse, and for me, Luhmühlen’s ground can sometimes be a bit variable, and it wouldn’t necessarily suit this horse. So I thought, why not give it a crack?”
He is, he continues, “so talented – he’s probably one of the most talented horses I’ve sat on in terms of his athleticism and his ability. But his brain is quite difficult. He can be quite sharp and quite spooky, and just as you think you’re getting somewhere, suddenly you’re halfway across the school, facing the other direction.”
Today, though, the inexperienced gelding managed the pressure cooker of the main arena with an admirable professionalism. The pair put a 32.2 on the board, which nets them fourth place at this early stage, and sits on the business end of their four-star average.
“I was really pleased with how he coped in there, because that’s a big ask for any horse, especially one that’s not the most experienced,” says Tom of the former Max Warburton ride, who he took on in 2024. “I’m delighted with him. He’s only 10, and in his first five star, and he’s quite a spooky horse, naturally, so to just go in and do quite solid test like that is really pleasing. Hopefully there’s plenty of time to build on that in the next few years.”
Katie Magee and Treworra. Photo by Sophie Robins/Girl In The Field.
The reigning British Open Champions, Katie Magee and the twelve-year-old Treworra, have put some standout scores on the board over the last year: a 27 at the four-star level at Scone Palace, a 29.3 at Burghley, and a 26.8 in their prep run a couple of weeks ago at Burnham Market CCI4*-S, most notably. But while their 33.3 today didn’t flirt with their personal best, it still offers them a competitive enough starting point from which to tackle their next moves – and their bid for a top ten finish, which they so narrowly missed out on when finishing eleventh here last year.
Though their work in the ring was polite and pleasant, a sub-30 was precluded by some subtle moments of apparent disconnect between front and back, which saw their marks occasionally drift to mid-table.
“He stayed with me, and he stayed nice and soft and relaxed,” says Katie. “I think I could have been just a fraction more positive, but he was brilliant. He did some lovely lateral work – I think I just needed to push for those slightly higher marks, but that was my fault.”
“He is,” she continues with a broad smile, “a gorgeous horse inside and out, and I’m very lucky to ride him.”
We’re beginning again with the afternoon session shortly here at Badminton, so keep it locked on EN for a full end-of-day report, and follow along on the livestream thanks to Badminton TV. We’ll see you on the flip side. Go Eventing.
The top ten at Thursday lunchtime at MARS Badminton.
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