{"id":33368,"date":"2026-03-29T21:55:00","date_gmt":"2026-03-29T20:55:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/julien-epaillard-and-hardrock-queen-hjd-reign-in-sundays-csi3-1-50m-oliva-nova-beach-golf-resort-grand-prix-at-spring-met-iii-2026\/"},"modified":"2026-03-30T07:08:53","modified_gmt":"2026-03-30T06:08:53","slug":"julien-epaillard-and-hardrock-queen-hjd-reign-in-sundays-csi3-1-50m-oliva-nova-beach-golf-resort-grand-prix-at-spring-met-iii-2026","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/julien-epaillard-and-hardrock-queen-hjd-reign-in-sundays-csi3-1-50m-oliva-nova-beach-golf-resort-grand-prix-at-spring-met-iii-2026\/","title":{"rendered":"Julien Epaillard and Hard\u2019Rock Queen HJD reign in Sunday\u2019s CSI3* 1.50m Oliva Nova Beach &amp; Golf Resort Grand Prix at Spring MET III 2026"},"content":{"rendered":"\n<p>France\u2019s 2024 Olympic team bronze medallist Julien Epaillard and the 9-year-old gelding Hard\u2019Rock Queen HJD (Lauterbach x Coolcorran Cool Diamond) won Sunday\u2019s CSI3* 1.50m Oliva Nova Beach &amp; Golf Resort Grand Prix at Centro Ecuestre Oliva Nova in Spain, where the third part of Spring MET 2026 concluded.<br>\u00a0<br>Stopping the clock on 32.78 seconds in a jump-off between twelve horse-and-rider combinations, the current world number eight took the win ahead of Antoine Ermann (FRA) and Floyd des Pres (Vigo Cece x Papillon Rouge) in second in 33.88, while Jan Vinckier (BEL) with Diadem Melloni (Diamant de Semilly x Con Air) completed the podium in third with a time of 35.26.<br>\u00a0<br>\u201cThe course was nice, it was not\u00a0very big, but a delicate 1.50m and technical to ride,\u201d Epaillard said about the track set by Christian Wiegand (GER).<\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img fetchpriority=\"high\" decoding=\"async\" width=\"819\" height=\"1024\" src=\"http:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-2-1-819x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-33358\" srcset=\"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-2-1-819x1024.jpg 819w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-2-1-240x300.jpg 240w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-2-1-768x960.jpg 768w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-2-1-580x725.jpg 580w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-2-1-860x1075.jpg 860w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-2-1.jpg 960w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 819px) 100vw, 819px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p>Speaking about his winning ride, the 9-year-old gelding Hard\u2019Rock Queen HJD \u2013 owned by Celine Baron \u2013 Epaillard said: \u201cAlain Bourdon competed him&nbsp;last year&nbsp;at&nbsp;1.45m level. This winter, he called me because he thinks&nbsp;this one&nbsp;is a good horse, and he wanted to&nbsp;do something together. I took him here in February, and this was his first three-star Grand Prix. He jumped super today. He is young&nbsp;and green, but I feel that he is super careful and has a lot of scope. He is easy&nbsp;to ride, he just needs a little bit more experience. I think&nbsp;he is&nbsp;a Grand&nbsp;Prix horse and&nbsp;maybe a championship&nbsp;horse as well.\u201d<br>&nbsp;<br>\u201cI like to come here,\u201d Epaillard, a regular in Oliva Nova, said about the venue. \u201cI think they do a good job; you have classes at every level, the conditions are&nbsp;very nice, and the ground is super. The fence material is good, so&nbsp;the horses gain experience.\u201d<br>&nbsp;<br>Clem McMahon (IRL) on Carneyhaugh Unison (Cornet Obolensky x Don Juan de La Bouverie) finished fourth when crossing the finish line in 35.65 seconds, followed by Caroline Rehoff Pedersen (DEN) aboard Polonis L (Le Blue Diamond van\u2019T Ruytershof x Andiamo) in fifth in 35.70.<br>&nbsp;<br>Spring MET 2026 continues with the fourth and final part of the tour in April, as the action at Centro Ecuestre Oliva Nova resumes on April 7th.<strong><a href=\"https:\/\/online.equipe.com\/startlists\/1212739\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noreferrer noopener\">Click here for full results.<\/a><\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n<figure class=\"wp-block-image size-large\"><img decoding=\"async\" width=\"1024\" height=\"1024\" src=\"http:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-1024x1024.jpg\" alt=\"\" class=\"wp-image-33364\" srcset=\"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-1024x1024.jpg 1024w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-300x300.jpg 300w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-150x150.jpg 150w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-768x768.jpg 768w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-180x180.jpg 180w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-580x580.jpg 580w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-860x860.jpg 860w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1-1160x1160.jpg 1160w, https:\/\/metoliva.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/03\/Spring-MET-III-2026-3-1.jpg 1200w\" sizes=\"(max-width: 1024px) 100vw, 1024px\" \/><\/figure>\n\n\n\n<p><strong>The\u00a0photos may be used\u00a0<em>only<\/em>\u00a0in relation to this press release and must include<br>photo credit to\u00a0\u00a9 Herv\u00e9 Bonnaud \/ www.1clicphoto.com.<\/strong><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>France\u2019s 2024 Olympic team bronze medallist Julien Epaillard and the 9-year-old gelding Hard\u2019Rock Queen HJD (Lauterbach x Coolcorran Cool Diamond) won Sunday\u2019s CSI3* 1.50m Oliva Nova Beach &amp; Golf Resort Grand Prix at Centro Ecuestre Oliva Nova in Spain, where the third part of Spring MET 2026 concluded.\u00a0Stopping the clock on 32.78 seconds in a&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":33362,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[152],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-33368","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-spring-met-2026"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33368","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=33368"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33368\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":33370,"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/33368\/revisions\/33370"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/33362"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=33368"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=33368"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/metoliva.com\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=33368"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}