WEF Week 5: Vogel, Gangster Montdesir and the Numbers Behind a Defining Victory
In a Grand Prix built on data‑driven expectations, it was the so‑called wildcard, Richard Vogel’s Gangster Montdesir, that rewrote the script and confirmed WEF’s reputation as the sport’s most reliable launchpad for historic seasons.
Under the Saturday Night Lights in Wellington, Richard Vogel and Gangster Montdesir had their own ideas about how the WEF season’s first CSI5* should turn out. In the $500,000 Fidelity Investments Grand Prix packed with proven stars and long‑running streaks, the ten‑year‑old stallion stepped decisively out of the “wildcard” category, once again finishing ahead of a flawless Ben Maher and Enjeu de Grisien and signaling that WEF 2026 may have just crowned the partnership to watch.
The Wildcard: Gangster Montdesir Versus the Model
EquiRatings flagged Richard Vogel and Gangster Montdesir as the class’s true unknown: a wildcard with flawless form but limited data at this exact height. The model rated their probability of jumping clear in Round 1 at just 38%, a cautious figure driven by a small sample size rather than any lack of quality.
Sport, however, tends to expose the limits of even the best models. In the 12 months leading into Wellington, Gangster Montdesir had started three CSI5* 1.60m classes and jumped clear in all of them, giving the stallion a 100% clear record at the level and already one five‑star Grand Prix victory to his name in Lyon in late 2025. Every new test has been met not only with composure but with winning intent, and Wellington simply added another data point to an increasingly convincing trend.
Saturday Night Lights: How the Jump‑Off Was Won
When the dust settled, eight combinations advanced to the jump‑off under the lights, setting up exactly the kind of high‑pressure, high‑speed test EquiRatings had anticipated. Gangster Montdesir, still flawless at CSI5* 1.60m, rose to the moment, stopping the clock in 42.65 seconds to secure the victory by roughly three‑tenths of a second.
Greya’s title defense came agonizingly close to success. Kent Farrington and the mare delivered the quickest jump‑off round of the night, but a light touch at the final fence turned what looked like a repeat victory into a heartbreaking four‑fault score and pushed them down to a fifth‑place finish, a reminder that in this class even the most dominant partnerships live on a knife‑edge.
That time from Vogel and Gangster was enough to deny 2021 Olympic champion Ben Maher and Enjeu de Grisien, whose own profile reads like a jump‑off specialist’s dream: every time they have reached a CSI5* 1.60m jump‑off, they have jumped clear and finished on the podium. Their runner‑up finish in Wellington extended that flawless conversion rate and mirrored their result in Lyon, where they again delivered a faultless, attacking round only to be edged by Vogel and Gangster Montdesir.
Streaks Rewritten: Mallevaey, Dynastie and the Power of Reliability
Behind the duel for the win, Nina Mallevaey and Dynastie de Beaufour quietly turned statistical possibility into history. By producing yet another clear at CSI5* 1.60m, they moved their streak to 11 consecutive clears, entering a group that only a handful of combinations have ever reached since 2010. Third place on the night told only part of the story; the real headline was their emergence as one of the most reliable big‑track partnerships in the modern sport.
EquiRatings’ historical database places that reliability in rarefied company, with very few horses able to pair that many consecutive clears with consistent podium finishes at five‑star level. In a sport where one touch of a rail can erase months of work, Mallevaey’s run with Dynastie de Beaufour illustrates how sustained consistency can be as potent a weapon as outright speed.
The Numbers Before the Night: Greya’s Near‑Miss
Heading into the 2026 edition, the EquiRatings Prediction Model installed title defenders Kent Farrington and Greya as the safest statistical bet in the field, assigning them a 59% clear‑round probability, the highest in the class. Their jump‑off record backed that confidence: 11 clears from 14 previous 1.60m jump‑offs, converting those rounds into nine wins and 11 podium finishes.
Those numbers were almost reinforced in dramatic style. Greya’s rapid but four‑fault jump‑off underlined both why the mare arrived as favorite and why this Grand Prix is so unforgiving: one rail can be the difference between repeating history and watching a new storyline take over the stage.
Beyond the Win: Why This Grand Prix Matters
The pattern around this class is now hard to ignore: when riders win the Fidelity Investments Grand Prix, their seasons often tilt toward the historic. Farrington and Greya turned their 2025 victory into a record‑shattering nine‑win year; Martin Fuchs and Clooney used their 2019 success as a springboard to seven five‑star Grand Prix and World Cup victories; Kent Farrington and Gazelle’s 2017 triumph preceded what was then a record season of eight major wins.
Against that backdrop, Vogel’s faultless campaign with Gangster Montdesir—four CSI5* Grand Prix starts together, four clear rounds, and now two major wins—looks less like an anomaly and more like the beginning of a familiar storyline. If the past decade is any guide, the 2026 Fidelity Investments Grand Prix may be remembered not only for the upset it produced on the night, but for the record‑chasing season it signals is still to come.