USA’s Phillip Dutton, aka “The Messiah of Eventing,” lived up to his well-earned moniker on Saturday.
The Olympic individual bronze medalist entered three horses in the FEI CIC 3* division at The Fork. Held at Tryon International Equestrian Center in North Carolina, the annual three day competition is doubling as the FEI World Equestrian Games™ Eventing Test Event.
This year, everything’s coming up Dutton.
As of the cross country phase, the world number four doesn’t just have a lock on the overnight lead. He holds three of the top four positions—all within three and a half penalty points of another.
“The goal was to step things up a bit from what I’ve been doing as far as speed goes,” said the human stopwatch, who finished all three rounds within an eight second window.
“I thought the course in general rode well. It’s golf course terrain, so you’re working all of the time with your lines and the different elements of up and down.”
Leading the pack is Z.
Dutton…
