Tessa Bradcock Celebrates

DEFENDER Horse of the Year is held in Hastings annually, where riders from the North and South Islands compete for prestigious National Titles.

With Tessa Bradcock recently stepping up to 3* on the eventing circuit successfully, 2025 seemed a good year to venture over to Hastings and compete at Horse of the Year Show for the first time. With the huge atmosphere, it’s quite different to other events. She entered in the Eventing which has three phases; dressage, showjumping and cross country. Her class entered was the Defender CCI3*.

Tessa got her 8-year-old mare, Ceremony (paddock name Grace) as a 5-year-old. Ceremony had a foal as a 4-year-old, then had 6 months of show jumping before Tessa got her. Eventing was very new for Ceremony, but Tessa’s dedication and training saw their amazing partnership form and move up the levels quite quickly, with many successes along the way. “Absolutely love this little horse and how she gives me 110% every time we go down the centre line,enter a ring, or leave the XC start box; she's got my back no matter the day."

On the first day competing at HOY, Tessa and Ceremony were sitting in 14th place after the dressage phase; the second day was show jumping, which saw Tessa jump up the placings to sit in 3rd position after their clear round. The third day was cross country with Tessa and Ceremony finishing clear and under time, moving them up again to take the win. The pair added no penalties to their impressive dressage score of 38.2, securing a well-deserved victory. They were the only combination in their class to finish on their dressage score. “A day that I’ve dreamt about for a few years now! Everything just went to plan and Grace gave me the best feeling out on cross country. I think she would have jumped anything I pointed her at. No one deserved to be crowned the CCI3* event horse of the year more than her”.

Tessa’s next big adventure is the National Three Day event which is to be held in Christchurch this year over Easter. Tessa will take her other horse down there to compete while Grace gets a very well-deserve dholiday