The first week of the Traverse City Spring Horse Show, concluded Sunday afternoon with the highly anticipated $213,300 Turtle Creek Casino & Hotel Grand Prix CSI4*. A total of 25 talented international horse-and-rider combinations had their shot at the lion’s share of the prize money, with seven hopeful athletes advancing to the jump-off tie-breaker. Taking a gamble on his up-and-coming mount Cachemire de Braize, RED MILLS rider Daniel Bluman played his cards right to emerge victorious as the winner for the second day in a row at Flintfields Horse Park.
Bluman entered the arena riding Over the Top Stables LLC’s Cachemire de Braize. As the winning pair from Saturday’s $36,600 1.45m Winning Round CSI4*, Bluman and the 9-year-old Selle Français gelding had plenty of confidence going into the jump-off round. Leaving it all in the arena to conclude the class, Bluman and Cachemire de Braize moved swiftly across the ground to make up as much time as they could. Their efforts paid off as they crossed through the timers in 33.01 seconds, ultimately lending the pair the first place honors.
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RED MILLS Rider Daniel Bluman: “I wasn’t even going to bring (Cachemire de Braizee), I’ll be honest. Mark Bluman, my cousin, has been riding him but I felt I was coming a little weak here this week and I wanted to have a speed horse to jump in the other classes, so I put Cachemire in the truck. At the end we were able to ride two horses in this class so I put him in the (grand prix) just to see what happened. Things didn’t work out for me with the stallion (Ubiluc), I turned too tight to fence number two and the horse didn’t really get a chance to see it. He jumped good after that but I was disappointed and I really gave my best today with Cachemire, both in the first round and the jump-off, so I’m thrilled.”
“I think I was a touch faster from fence one to two than Camilo [Rueda] was, then I think I was quite a bit the same everywhere else. Then to the last line I did one less stride. It walked very long in eight strides and I did seven strides. I was committed and it worked out!”
