29 December 2013

Mechelen: Koos de Ronde has won the first competition!

Much to his delight, Koos de Ronde (NED) has won the first competition at the FEI World Cup Driving in Mechelen with a small advantage ahead of Georg von Stein (GER). Hungarian four-in-hand driver Jozsef Dobrovitz was five seconds slower than Von Stein, took the third place.

Koos de Ronde was driving the same team as in London last week where he finished second. „The marathon obstacles went very well but on the longer ways I lost some speed.” Despite that the other two drivers of the top three drove a clear round as well, he was able to win the warm-up competition in the Nekkerhall today. Theo Timmerman (NED) put down the fastest time in Mechelen but he had two knockdowns which resulted the fifth place for him. It will be a very exciting competition for Timmerman tomorrow because if he wants to be in the top 6 drivers who will start in Bordeaux at the FEI World Cup Driving Final early February, he has to be on the top tomorrow. De Ronde can not earn any World Cup points at Mechelen as he is competing with a wild card, as well as the young Belgian driver Glenn Geerts who finished sixth. Sweden’s Tomas Eriksson drove a fast round but had two balls down which dropped him out of the top three and finished on the fourth place.
Jozsef Dobrovitz jun. with Bram Chardon as the navigator groom ended on the seventh place, due to a corrected error of course in the first marathon obstacle and had three balls down, so he will be the first driver to start tomorrow.

Click here for the results
Click here for the photos, thanks to Marie de Ronde.
Click here for the videos.