Five Horses to Follow at The Fork at Tryon

The Fork at Tryon opens the closing run this weekend. Qualifier 15 of 20, and the first of the last five before the US Equestrian Open of Eventing Final at Morven Park from October 8.

Four of the top six on the Series leaderboard are entered: Boyd Martin third on 190 points, Caroline Pamukcu fourth on 185, Lucienne Bellissimo fifth on 175, and Waylon Roberts sixth on 110.

Other recognizable names are here too. Lindsay Traisnel & Bacyrouge return to defend the win they took at this Qualifier in September 2025. Julie Wolfert & SSH Playboy arrive with the chance to become the first combination in Series history to win two Qualifiers back to back.

HSH Double Sixteen is entered for Pamukcu, the only combination in the US Equestrian Open to have won more than two Qualifiers. Luke 140 makes his first start of 2026 for Martin, back from some time off since Maryland 5*.

But today, let's look past some of the established names. Plenty on this entry list are worth following, so here are five. Two are making their CCI4*-S debut this week and two more are already top of their age group in the country on the EquiRatings Elo. The fifth is the newest ride in Boyd Martin's string and one of the best show jumpers in the field. There is good chance some of these horses are on Series leaderboards and team lists for years to come.

Cooley Corraghy Diamond won his most recent four-star start, the CCI4*-S at Bouckaert Equestrian on August 21. The August running at Bouckaert is not a Series Qualifier, so the win paid no points. It did move his Elo up 34 to 587, the highest of any nine-year-old in the US and 82 clear of the third on that list, HSH Sebastian, also entered here.

The record underneath the rating is the part worth reading. Twelve completed international starts, twelve top-ten finishes, four of them wins.

The first phase is worth watching this weekend. He scored between 28.3 and 30.7 at two and three-star, drifted to the mid 30s across his first season at four-star in 2025, and has come back to 29.2 and 30.1 in his two runs since June. Severson has been clear about where she thinks he is going.

Winsome Andante, known at home as Dan, won Kentucky three times with Severson. That is a pretty huge comparison she has reached for.

HSH Sebastian steps up to CCI4*-S for the first time with the second best 6RA in the field on 29.5, behind only Luke 140. One caveat comes with it. The 6RA counts the last six international tests at any level, and all six of his were at three-star. How the mark holds at four-star, with the addition of tougher movements, is the question of his week.

Six top-ten finishes from seven starts in 2025, then third at Stable View Spring International in April on a 33.9 and tenth in the Tryon CCI3*-L in May. He has competed at The Fork at Tryon twice before, including taking the win at two-star in September 2024.

He was produced in Ireland by Patrick Whelan, who ran him internationally across 2023 and 2024 before he came to the US. Pamukcu has had him since the middle of 2024 and does not hide what she thinks of him.

ESI Nixon has jumped double clear at every international he has completed. Six starts, five completions, and the one exception is his FEI debut, a CCI2*-L at Bromont in June 2025 where he was eliminated on cross-country.

The record shows up in the metrics. His SJ6 is 0.0, no faults at all across his last six international show jumping rounds, and his SJ6 Adj of -4.6 is the best in the field.

There is a reason for it. Having came from Ennisnag Stud, he jumped in Ireland with Gemma Phelan and the pedigree is jumping bred on both sides rather than the blood eventing lines.

The rest of him is unproven, and that is the honest read. His 6RA of 36.0 is among the highest in the field and he averages 9.8 cross-country time penalties.

Jessica Phoenix sits twelfth in the Series on 65 points with four scoring slots still open, and she brings Cosmo GS as well.

Fernhill Bertus is the highest rated eight-year-old in the US on 530 Elo and 14th in the world in his age group. His rating peaked at 563 in May, when he was second in the world in the age group behind Brookfield Danny de Muze, last year's Le Lion d'Angers champion.

He got there on a record almost nothing his age could match. Nine international starts and not one jumping penalty in either phase, from his first run in May 2024 through to Stable View Spring International in April 2026.

Four-star has asked harder questions. He went to Tryon for his first run at the level in May, picked up a flag penalty on cross-country and finished ninth, and the pole he had in the show jumping ended a streak of 9 consecutive clears. Rebecca Farm saw them pick up 60 jumping penalties in the CCI3*-L and retire on course.

However, this just seems like a horse working out a new level rather than a horse found out by it, and at 25, Maddy Temkin has time to let it come right. 

Boyd Martin has two rides here and Fetiche Des Rouges is the lesser known of the two. Martin is third in the Series on 190 points with all six counting slots filled, so anything either of his horses wins at Tryon has to displace a score he already owns. Full detail on where the title chase stands is here.

The 11-year-old, known at home as Radish, has three CCI4*-S starts in 2026 and was second at Bromont in June. Bromont is in Canada and is not a Series Qualifier, so that result paid nothing to his Series standing.

Aoife Clark produced him. Laura Collett took the ride when Clark was off injured and won a CCI3*-L at Lisgarven and a CCI3*-S at Burgham with him in 2023. Martin has had him since the start of 2024 and is still finding the ceiling.