Membury based Flora Harris recorded her first three-day win last weekend at Hopetoun.

Harris achieved the CCI two-star victory riding Cesano H, owned by her mother Caroline.

Harris said: “It took us eight hours to get there but it was worth the long journey. He’s relatively experienced at Intermediate now and he’s ready to move up to three-star, so I wanted him to do another CCI two-star in preparation for moving up.

“I didn’t expect to win, I don’t think you can ever expect to win, but I felt I had a chance of being competitive. He’s a really lovely horse and I thought we could give it a really good crack. I’m so happy with him.”

There was drama early on after an error in the dressage scoring, as Harris explained: “I was so happy when I heard he was in the lead with 36, and then I went off to walk the course only to find out there had been a mathematical error so I wasn’t in the lead I was actually in fifth place. I was quite gutted because I felt it had been a great test, the horse is really talented on the flat and I thought he’d finally got the marks he deserved.

“It was disappointing but I still felt we were in the hunt if he could deliver in the jumping so I just had to focus on the next phase. He then jumped a really great double clear so it all worked out.

“Cesano had done some showjumping before he came to me but he started his eventing career quite late on really. He’s quite opinionated and has quite a lot of ego too but has been really rewarding and he’s just such a fighter.

“Longer term I plan to take him to Blenheim for the CIC three-star, and he will maybe go to Camphire. His next event is Aston-Le-Walls in 3 weeks.”