Boyd Martin gained 125 points last September. This year he only needs 50 more to take the Series lead.

Five qualifiers remain in a Series of twenty. Tamie Smith leads on 235 points, Will Coleman is second on 215, and Boyd Martin is third on 190. All three have their six counting slots filled, which changes how points work from here. A new result no longer adds to a total. It replaces the weakest score already in it.

Martin has built a title out of exactly this position before. On September 10 last year he had 135 points on the board and Phillip Dutton had led the standings since November. Three weeks later Martin had 260 and the $25,000. The venue that turned it was The Fork at Tryon, and it is the next qualifier on the calendar.

Martin's 2025 campaign ran on three rides at a time rather than a single horse. Two qualifiers had put points on his board before September. Then came four scoring results across The Fork and Plantation Field, three of them in the same weekend.

Martin's 190 is all six of his counting scores, the weakest of them a 20 from Bouckaert International in March. That 20 is his floor. Anything new has to beat it to be worth a point.

Smith's 235 is the harder set to attack. Three qualifier wins sit inside it, so only her bottom two scores are soft. All three of the leading riders carry a 20 at the base of their total, which means all three have the same first move available.

US Equestrian Open, Eventing 2026

Before the Fork at Tryon

1   Tamie Smith

235

Carolina  ·  Kentucky  ·  Tryon  ·  Ocala

50

50

50

40

25

20

2   Will Coleman

215

Kentucky  ·  Tryon  ·  TerraNova  ·  Carolina

45

45

40

35

30

20

3   Boyd Martin

190

Tryon  ·  Bouckaert  ·  Fair Hill  ·  Carolina

40

35

35

30

30

20

4   Caroline Pamukcu

185

Carolina  ·  Bouckaert  ·  Fair Hill

45

40

40

25

20

15

5   Lucienne Bellissimo

175

Stable View  ·  Bouckaert (Oct)  ·  TerraNova  ·  Tryon

50

40

35

35

10

5

Shaded pills are Martin's three lowest counting scores, the ones a new result replaces first. 

Two things have changed at the venue since Martin's 115-point weekend. The 2025 running carried more than 25 starters and paid on the large qualifier scale, 50 for a win down to 5 for tenth.

This year's entry sits at 25 or fewer, which moves it to the small scale: 40 for a win, 35 for second, and nothing at all below eighth. 

He also ran three horses there last year. This year he only has two, Luke 140 and Fetiche Des Rouges, after Shanroe Cooley was withdrawn following his win at the American Eventing Championships.

Luke 140 is the horse who produced the 45 points at The Fork last September, with a second place finish. The Fork will be his first run of 2026, having last competed internationally at Maryland 5*. He is 15 now and this is his second recent layoff of the kind: he did not start internationally at all in 2024 before coming back in March 2025 to run six times, including a fourth at Stable View and a seventh at Kentucky 5*. 

The 20 points sitting at the bottom of Martin's Series total came from Fetiche Des Rouges, seventh at Bouckaert International in March. The horse who set the floor is entered to raise it.

The 11 year old, known at home as Radish, has three CCI4*-S starts in 2026, most recently coming second at Bromont in June on a 50.7. Bromont is in Canada, and is therefore not a Series qualifier.

He is also a slightly newer ride in the string. Aoife Clark produced him with Laura Collett taking over the ride during Clark's injury layoff. Collett won a CCI3*-L at Lisgarven in Ireland and a CCI3*-S at Burgham with him in 2023, and Martin has had him since the start of 2024. 

Commando 3 has been one of Boyd Martin's superstar horses of the past number of years.

After some time off following Kentucky 5*, he is entered at The Fork in the CCI2*, not the qualifier, so no Series points are available to him this weekend. What matters is what comes after it. Stable View Oktoberfest on September 25 is a qualifier, and Commando 3 has won that venue's CCI4*-S twice.

There is a route to 235. It runs through the three East Coast qualifiers. Matching Smith on 235 would send the Series to a tie-break, decided first on lowest overall score, so 50 points is the number that takes the lead outright.

The Fork then Plantation Field is the same sequence that decided the 2025 Series. Plantation Field is also the closest of the three to Martin's Pennsylvania base.

Martin said something after winning the inaugural Series at Morven Park that reads differently now he is the one chasing.

Forty five points, five qualifiers, and a Final at Morven Park from October 8. The Fork will not settle the Series but it will decide whether he is still in the running three weeks from now.