When older brother Quzier committed a jumping fault on the very last fence, the crowd, estimated at 650, let out a collective sigh. It wasn't that they had anything invested in Quzier Ambak's horse, Calano, but during the jump-off of the World Cup qualifier, the crowd was hoping for another perfect performance.
In the end, however, it was the younger Malaysian brother, Qabil, on Parvina who won the World Cup qualifier (the sixth of 10 in the Southeast Asian League). He completed his round in the two-person jump-off without fault and in a time of 64.17 seconds. Quzier Ambak finished second on Calano while Hong Kong's Jennifer Chang was third on Luxor 91.
'I thought the course was quite technical,' Qabil Ambak said. 'The height for the first round was asking a lot from the horse.'
Technicalities on the course included distances between fences, tricky lines and the fences themselves, set between 1.4-1.6 metres. One combination, a treble, near the end of the course, was particularly troublesome.
Rounds of the World Cup qualifier took place in Malaysia before moving to Hong Kong for four weekend shows. While there were just six entries in the HK$30,000 World Cup class, organisers said they anticipate additional entries in the class for the three remaining shows.
'We had one or two horses that were not 100 per cent fit today so the riders said don't ride today so they can concentrate on the next week and have them fit then,' Hong Kong Equestrian Federation secretary-general Soenke Lauterbach said.