On 24 and 25 May, Driving Association Zuidwolde organised its annual combined driving competition. With the pony Stapleford Joint Venture and her father Gerard Benneker as groom, Lynley Benneker took part in a combined driving competition for the first time. In the L pony class, she was one of 25 participating combinations.
On Saturday morning, May 24, the competition started for Lynley with the driving the dressage test. Due to a mix-up of the invisible bin letters on the AC line (L), a considerable sloppiness was made at the beginning of the test. Despite a poor start, the thread was quickly picked up energetically and an acceptable dressage test was eventually run. The test was eventually judged with 62.5%, or 60 penalty points, which resulted in a shared 9th place.
Following this, Lynley had to ride the cones test. Well within the set time, Lynley managed to lead her combination clear through the 16 gates. With 6 other combinations, this earned her 0 penalty points in the cones test ! A very good result ! And with that, she moved up in the intermediate rankings from 9th to 7th place.
On Sunday morning 25 May, Lynley had to start early in the marathon. The A section of the marathon was run within the set times and thus did not result in any penalties. In the six obstacles in the B-track, no penalties were incurred, although Joint Venture still needs to develop a little more speed in the obstacles and be willing to ‘dive’ down into the water trough unobstructed. But, the 1st time remains a challenge !
In the end, 84.32 time penalties were incurred in the B section of the marathon, resulting in a 17th place in the marathon.
With a total penalty points of 144.32, they ended up finishing 14th in the final standings and the first profit point. A fine result for the first combined driving competition.