There was a sense of deja vu at Olympia on Saturday afternoon when John Whitaker claimed the top ration of World Cup points on a 19-year-old horse, just as he had done 12 months ago to the very day.
The cast list was slightly altered, with Whitaker this time teamed up with Virtual Village Welham, whereas stablemate Grannusch had provided the winning horsepower last time. But otherwise it was a repeat of 1998, with Whitaker thrilling a capacity crowd as he scorched to victory.
He had the worst of the draw - first of nine against the clock. "I knew I had to take some chances", he said afterwards, and he did it in glorious style, snaking round the track and hurtling across the finish to stop the clock on 36.79 and set what proved to be an unbeatable target.
Waiting in the wings, Germany's Lars Nieberg was next in and gave it his best shot with Loro Piana Esprit, five years Welham's junior. But although the time on the clock was a winning one - by close to a second - the back rail on the final fence hit the dirt, much to the relief of the partisan British audience.
Peter Charles was next with Traxdata Amber du Montois, but the mare dived onto the back rail of the double three from home and four faults in 39.25 was only good enough for seventh in the final analysis. The 10 points that he earned did, however, boost Charles to joint-14th in the western European league when combined with the 15 picked up for third in the Millstreet round last month.
Belgium's Ludo Philippaerts was first to join Whitaker with a double clear, but was over a second adrift before Dutch rider Carry Huisin't Veld, a member of Holland's first ever winning team at Kerrygold Dublin in August flew round clear with the grey Iceberg just .23 in arrears.
Geoff Billington lost his chance when It's Otto, another from the Virtual Village stable, ducked out at the third, but next man in, Switzerland's Beat Mandli, then clocked exactly the same time as the Dutch challenger and, when neither Jos Lansink nor Robert Smith could leave all the fences standing, Whitaker could finally be declared the winner.
Incredibly, these were the first points that Whitaker, a back-toback winner of the World Cup final in 1990 and '91, has picked up this series. He failed to make the cut in Amsterdam and Berlin and looked a doubtful starter here in London with two fences down in the eliminator. But he just scraped in, 17th of the 20 through, and then made the most of it to find his way into the winner's enclosure.
Whitaker is now best placed of the British in the western European standings, sharing 23rd place with Ireland's winner in the Spanish round, Billy Twomey, who missed out on a wild card invitation to Olympia after a disappointing outing in Amsterdam. Whitaker promptly made it a double by winning the following Top Score, but it was Olympia debutante Alison Firestone who picked up the big money yesterday, scooping the prize pot in the Kickon Masters with the only clear in a four-way jump-off.
The 23-year-old, who admitted that she had fallen asleep in her riding clothes at Saturday night's show party, netted the biggest win of her career when last to go with the 11-year-old Selle Francais mare Arnica de la Barre. Under the Masters formula, Firestone would have collected u21,000 £21,000 had all seven runners gone clear throughout the five rounds, but her winnings were slashed to just u13,500 £13,500 when her rivals all faulted.
