With their clean sweep of the Grand Prix classes at both the Paragon CDI*** in Estes Park, Colorado, and Dressage at Devonwood in Oregon, Adrienne Lyle and Wizard made a triumphant return to competition. Fans of Lyle may have wondered where she’s been this past year.
After winning the Brentina Cup in 2008, she and Wizard made a serious leap to the big leagues when they won the Freestyle at the 2009 Festival of Champions. Pretty heady stuff for a girl who grew up doing Western riding on a cattle ranch on Whidbey Island, Washington. Then, after last year’s National Dressage Championships, she all but disappeared from action. But Lyle—and Wizard, a 12-year-old Oldenburg gelding (by Weltmeyer x Classiker) are officially back, and they’re setting their sights on London in 2012.
Of course, Lyle, the 26-year-old former working student for dressage icon Debbie McDonald (she‘s now assistant trainer at Peggy and Parry Thomas’s River Grove Farm in Hailey, ID) never went anywhere. But in December, Wizard underwent surgery to remove the lower part of the splint bone in his left foreleg. Says Lyle, “We probably should have removed it after Gladstone. But we were trying to get it to heal naturally. He was never lame riding, just a hair sore at the palpation of it.”
Read the complete story on Dressagedaily.com
Related Links
Scores 2011 CDI Estes Park
Adrienne Lyle Wins 2008 American “Brentina Cup” Championship
Riders Refuse to Let Rain Drown Competition at 2009 Festival of Champions