HAVING spent the last few weeks looking to the skies Barbury Estate owner Nigel Bunter can finally relax as the weather gods have been kind to the largest international eventing competition.

More than 1,000 riders and horses are set to descend on the Marlborough Downs over the next four days to compete at the Barbury Horse Trials and the going couldn’t be better according to Bunter.

“We’re feeling good because it looks like the weather has really helped us this year,” he said, ahead of the start of the trials today.

“As you know, we had thunderstorms on Friday night and had a bit of rain on Tuesday and Sunday, which has really helped, because it has been a dry early summer.

“The going should be perfect, and the forecast is that the weekend should be lovely and sunny and warm, which is ideal. We have 1,150 horses entered, which makes us now the largest international event in the world.”

Top riders will be competing in the novice and two star classes, as well as the prestigious three star competition, across the four-day event, as well as the second running of the JCB Champions Challenge, in aid of the Injured Jockeys Fund on Saturday, where AP McCoy is poised to ride for the first time in public since retiring in April.

The event has grown hugely in the 10 years it has been running and Bunter has put that down to the conditions on the Downs and where it falls in the eventing calender.

“We have always been fortunate that the riders, right from the first year in 2005, have always supported us,” he said.

“I think they came in the first year not knowing what to expect, but I think, because we have such great ground conditions here, they have always been confident that if they bring their horses to Barbury the going is near perfect.

“It is so important to them and up here on the Downs the grass is near perfect. I think the word gets around that you can bring your horses to Barbury in the summer and get good conditions.

“This is really the start of the autumn campaigns for them as they build towards, this year, the European Championships in Blare Castle, in Scotland, in September.

“They will use Barbury as the first outing for many of these horses since competing at Badminton in the spring.

“We fit nicely in the calendar because we are in between the two four-star events and I think that a reason why we get so many entries.”

Despite Andrew Nicholson, who has this year had a fence named after his steed Avebury, going for his fourth consecutive title Bunter has his eye on a few more local challengers to the crown.

“Both Tim and Jonelle Price are very much in good form and I expect them to put up a serious challenge,” he added. “You can never rule out Sir Mark Todd either and I rather suspect, of the younger generation Harry Meade might have a good Barbury.”