Victorious Delaveau at home in Hong Kong Masters

“It was great today, and my horse was fantastic,” Delaveau said after he and Aquila triumphed in the two-round competition over 1.60m-high obstacles. “I love it here in Hong Kong.” Indeed, the 53-year-old has a great track record in the city, having won four of the six competitive classes at the inaugural Longines Masters of Hong Kong in 2013, including that year’s Grand Prix.

This time, the 40th-ranked rider in the world and his 13-year-old chestnut gelding came out on top of a field of 20 horse-and-rider combinations, including Germany’s Daniel Deusser and Cornet D’Amour, winners of the Grand Prix at the opening leg of the three-part series, the Paris Masters in December.

In Hong Kong, Deusser was hoping to set himself up for one of the potential bonuses in the CSI5* trilogy, the Super Grand Slam, which pays out €2.25 million for consecutive Longines Grand Prix victories in Paris,  Hong Kong and New York in the same season. But while no one will receive that this year, Delaveau is now in the driver’s seat to aim for a different Grand Slam bonus: €1 million for three consecutive Grand Prix wins over two seasons – in this case, Hong Kong, then New York, then Paris. 

Even though Deusser and Cornet’s streak was stopped in Asia, the pair were close, finishing third in the Grand Prix behind Delaveau and runner-up Max Kühner of Austria on Cielito Lindo 2. All three podium finishers had zero faults in both rounds, with Delaveau’s 1st -, Kühner’s 2nd- and Deusser’s 3rd-place times in round two being: 37.81 sec, 37.88 sec and 37.96 sec respectively. The full results from the Grand Prix are here.

“My entire career has [had] a lot of ups and downs,” Delaveau has stated in the past, including, notably, his withdrawal from the 2012 Olympic Games in London due to an injury to his horse Orient Express HDC and his non-participation in the 2016 Games in Rio de Janeiro after Orient Express had not come back strongly after an injury. But Hong Kong has definitely been a place of some of the ‘ups’ for Delaveau, who counts British jumpers Michael and John Whitaker, and Nick Skelton among his role models.

Speaking of Michael Whitaker and British riders, this weekend in Hong Kong was also a successful one, with Whitaker and Robert Smith respectively winning Saturday’s six-bars Masters Power competition with Valentin R and Sunday’s 1.45m Masters One with Cimano E. And in the Grand Prix, Whitaker and Smith finished 5th and 6th on partners Calisto Blue and Ilton. The finale of the Longines Masters Series is set for New York from April 26-29, 2018.