BRITAIN’S Francis Whittington proved an extremely popular winner of the 24th Blenheim Palace International Horse Trials, jumping a perfect clear round on Catherine Witt’s Easy Target to give the sporting runner-up, William Fox-Pitt, no room for error on Freddie Mac.

Crowd figures were up 15% on last year and they had plenty to cheer about. In comparison to the antipodean bonanza in the CIC, this was a British one-two-three, with William second after Freddie Mac hit the first part of the treble, and Jodie Amos thrilled to find herself in such distinguished company, scoring a career best with third place on Wise Crack.