Aachen, 02. July 2008

German dressage team on the way to a Nations' Cup victory
Heike Kemmer ranks first in the interim results of the Grand Prix

Heike Kemmer (Winsen) cheered as she rode out of the dressage arena, accompanied by thunderous applause from the spectators. After the first part of the MEGGLE Prize, the Grand Prix of the CDIO Tour, the team World Champion is clearly heading the interim results on the 15-year-old gelding Bonaparte with a score of 72.250. This put the German team in the lead in the interim classification of the Lambertz Nations' Cup, which will be decided tomorrow. After the performances of the first two riders today, the German team currently ranks first with a total score of 139.0 points, followed by Sweden (135.208) and the Netherlands (134.583).
Vice World Champion, Kemmer's Bonaparte was in good form and made no mistakes, unfortunately things didn't run as smoothly for the newcomer Matthias-Alexander Rath (Kronberg). The 23-year-old rider, who has been causing a sensation on the dressage scene for the past three months and who won the men's title at the German Championships in Balve at the beginning of June, made a few mistakes with Sterntaler-Unicef and was awarded a score of 66.750 percent, rank 8 in the interim results. "I would really like to have repeated the performance I gave in Balve, especially with the Olympic Games in mind. But unfortunately the fine tuning between myself and Sterntaler wasn't quite right today," Rath explained. "I will do everything in my power to make sure that this first impression is forgotten when I ride the Grand Prix Spécial on Friday."

The second part of the Grand Prix competition continues on Thursday at 2 p.m. Nadine Capellmann (Aachen)/Elvis and Isabell Werth (Rheinberg)/Satchmo will be competing for Germany.

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