Paris Panthers pounce into pole position for Saturday’s showdown
Paris Panthers kickstarted their overall ranking comeback, with a phenomenal double clear from Nayel Nassar and Darragh Kenny in an edge-of-the-seat first round of the GCL competition in Monaco. A formidable display, both Kenny and Nassar pulled out all the stops to deliver two flawless clear rounds to be the only team to keep a zero score today. Home team Monaco Aces were hot on the Panthers’ heels in second with London Knights securing third.
Paris Panthers will start with a serious advantage in Saturday’s GCL Round 2, as the last team to go. Speaking about Saturday’s challenge Nayel said:
“Usually our team manager Rob doesn’t like us to take too much risk, we went at the end of the round as well so we knew exactly what we needed to do. There were no double clears yet so we just figured we shouldn’t take any unnecessary risk and put ourselves in a good position for Saturday.
” I thought when we [Paris Panthers] walked the course today it was already pretty bulky for the first day of a GCL but our horses really responded great and I felt like we put in two solid rounds – it’s good to start the week off like this.”
Talking about the triple combination that caught out many of the riders Darragh added:
“I think the line was a bit flat in the five to the big oxer going in and then really short the two big verticals. I think you just needed a really good horse today.”
The unique Monaco event is nestled next to the super-yachts in Port d’Hercule, where the pitlane of the Formula 1 races are held with the venue oozing sporting history and prowess. The compact arena offered up a flowing but technical course set by Uliano Vezzani who placed combinations up the long side as well as featuring a huge final plank vertical to finish.
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