Silvia Stopazzini and Lorenzo Lupacchini, along with Rosentolz 99 and longer Laura Carnabuci, became the first Italian vaulters to win a gold medal at a FEI World Equestrian Games. | Photo: FEI/Liz Gregg

An historic day for Italy at the Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI) World Equestrian Games (WEG) Tryon 2018, underway at the Tryon International Equestrian Center in Mill Spring, North Carolina, in the Christie’s International Real Estate arena, as pioneers Silvia Stopazzini and Lorenzo Lupacchini take the gold medal in the highly competitive pas de deux class.

They performed a masterful rendition of their Salsa routine, with flawless execution, to secure the top step on the podium. Alongside their noble steed Rosentolz 99 and longer Laura Carnabuci, their names will go down in the history books for Italy as the first Italian vaulters to win a gold medal at a FEI World Equestrian Games on a score of 9.027.

“At the end of last year I broke my foot and we missed out on the FEI World Cup,” said Lupacchini. “It was then we decided that we would come back even better than before. Therefore we trained and trained and repeated the freestyle and we could not be more pleased with the result