Philip McGuane Guides My Lady Van De Krekel To Top in $25,000 Lövsta Stuteri 7-Year-Old Developing Jumper Series Final
In an Irish clean sweep of the 2024 young horse finals at the Winter Equestrian Festival (WEF) on Friday, Philip McGuane piloted the Evergate Stables owned My Lady van de Krekel to win the featured $25,000 Lövsta Stuteri 7-Year-Old Developing Jumper Series Final.
The Lövsta Future Challenge is a well-established Swedish concept for talent development aimed at young grand prix horses and U25 riders in both dressage and jumping. The development tour’s vision is to provide the best possible conditions to strive for the highest level of international show jumping and hosted finals during WEF’s Horseware Ireland sponsored Week 10 at Wellington International.
Twenty-five qualified horses from the series entered the International Arena to jump courses designed by Oscar Soberon (USA). Thirteen advanced to a competitive jump-off with the lead changing hands several times. The best was saved for last, however, when Ireland’s Philip McGuane and Evergate’s Dutch Warmblood mare (Aganix du Seigneur x Numero Uno) stole the lead and the win. My Lady van de Krekel was bred by V.O.G. Bruynen in the Netherlands and purchased by the Evergate Stables team at the SLF Horse Auction in Belgium last summer.
“She’s super careful, not very big but she has a lot of qualities,” said McGuane of the mare. “Harrie Smolders tried her and really liked her so we only saw the videos and ended up buying her. She came over to us in August of last year.”
Clocking in at a blistering 38.133 seconds over the short course, McGuane put My Lady van de Krekel’s foot speed to good use to bump current leader Luis Fernando Larrazabal (COL) to second on Ribery.
Ribery, owned by Sabrina Lefebvre, won the last seven-year-old qualifier during WEF 9 and settled for the runner-up position in the Final. The young talent is a Belgian-bred Aganiz du Siegneur daughter with Diamant de Semilly on the dam’s side that Lefebvre purchased at the Youhorse Auction in 2021.
“The feeling everytime she goes in the ring, she tries 150%,” said Lrrazabal, who stopped the clock at 40.204 seconds. “I’m very lucky to be able to ride this mare; she’s so clever, so careful and she wants to do the job. As a rider, when you have a horse of this caliber, it’s very fun to ride.
“The track was super, a nice 1.35m class that we’ve been jumping every Friday since the season started, but it was fun because it was in the main ring,” said Larrazabal. “Giving them that opportunity is good for them to develop. I’ve been doing young horses for 10 years in the U.S. and the last couple years that Lövsta has been putting the effort in, it has been incredible.”
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