From Hawkes Bay Today:

In sport, you can have all the talent in the world but until you can produce results that can gauge your worthiness, you are doomed to obscurity.

That's how Tauranga horse owner Wendy Keddell would like to rate showjumper Ike Unsworth's sixth-round victory of the New Zealand World Cup series at the North Island Showjumping Championship in Dannevirke yesterday.

"I think it gives the rider the assurance that they are doing the right thing. It's certainly a boost and a confidence-builder for Ike," Keddell told SportToday last night after the the professional rider from Tauranga and his imported German-bred mare, Seremonie VDL, were the toast of the Central and Southern Hawke's Bay Showjumping Group-hosted feature event at the the Dannevirke A and P Showgrounds.

Dobel's Cento sired Seremonie from the mare, Rebel Z.

Unsworth, who won their only other world cup series class last year at Tauranga, pipped table leader and the only other double clear round combination, Katie McVean, of Mystery Creek, on Dunstan Delphi, to take the honours over the Leicester Jarden (Waikanae)-designed course.

Unsworth clocked 58.11 seconds to put the squeeze on McVean's earlier time of 59.12s in the second round.

"I was the last to go so I had the benefit of knowing what Katie had done," said Unsworth, who had dropped a fence for four faults in the third jump.

"Basically, I looked at where I could make up time by cutting a couple of corners," said the 28-year-old, who represented New Zealand in the Tri-Nations Championship in South Africa last year.

He found the weather in Dannevirke a little rough on Friday but it had cleared up, although yesterday the wind had also picked up, but he took it in his stride.

Eleven top combinations started, with eight making the cut to the second round. McVean was also third on Dunstan Daffodil, with last year's series winner Anna Trent, of Hawke's Bay, fourth on Cortaflex Nicalette NZPH, and fifth on Cortaflex Levitation.

McVean has a seven-point buffer over Trent on the leader board, with three rounds left in the series.

She and Dunstan Delphi also took out the North Island Showjumping super league class, with Brad Cunningham (Christchurch) and Cheltenham taking the young rider championship, and Timothy Myers (Taranaki) the win in the pony grand prix on Nectar.

Unsworth had found himself on the right side of the coin after Trent pipped him in the fifth-round world cup series at the Christmas Classic in Taupo on December 20.

Trent and her purpose-bred Selle Francaise horse, Cortaflex Nicalette NZPH, had come home with the advantage as the last to go in the second round with seven seconds to spare at the National Equestrian Centre.

The next series is in Woodhill (near Auckland) this weekend before the last two rounds in Gisborne.