Tenth Edition of AGDF Commences with Top Honors for Adrienne Lyle and Harmony’s Duval

Julie Bird

The gelding has now marked six wins in his last 13 starts, and Lyle hopes to continue on and refine their work this season. “With him,” she explained, “this is his second year at the Grand Prix. He knows his stuff now, but we’ve been trying to polish it all up. We’ve done a lot of halt rein-back, a lot of cantering and halting, [and] just a lot of work with halts because he’s not a huge fan of them, so we’ve worked on those moments where he could possibly get distracted and lose points.”

She continued, “We’re focusing on the Special with him this year. We’ve chosen not to focus on the Freestyle or World Cup Qualifiers in hopes of making the short list to go to Europe with him. We have a wonderful group of owners who are supporting us, and we’ll just keep on enjoying the season for now.”

Despite plenty of training time at home due to the global pandemic, Lyle is excited to have Duval back in competition, and admitted that the break wasn’t as beneficial for him as it was for others.

“We had time to train at home due to COVID, but it wasn’t a big advantage because he is a horse that needs to be exposed, out, and doing something,” she noted. “To sit at home all summer, it was a bit difficult to get his mind back into it, but his strength in the collection work is continuing to improve. His overall rideability has always been the biggest focus with him because he can get a little distracted.”

Second place in the class was captured by Susan Pape (GBR) on Harmony's Eclectisch, Harmony Sporthorses’ 12-year-old KWPN stallion by Zenon, earning a 70.522%. Third place went to Jennifer Williams (USA) on Millione, Millione Partners’ 18-year-old Danish Warmblood gelding by Milan (70.456%).