The Real Rider Cup, a charity jumping challenge that brings together Thoroughbred racing and three-day eventing, will return for the second year to the Plantation Field International Horse Trials in Unionville, Pa., on Sunday. A new cast of racing celebrities will be featured, including television commentators Gabby Gaudet and Maggie Wolfendale Morley, six-time leading steeplechase trainer Jack Fisher, and five-time champion steeplechase jockey Paddy Young. The event will have 16 riders competing on ex-racehorses in teams designated as Exercise Riders, Owners, Racing Analysts, and Trainers. The fastest over a course of a dozen 2 1/2-foot fences, with the fewest jumping penalties, will take home the Real Rider Cup. Each rider has pledged to raise at least $1,000 in donations and will wear the silks of a sponsor such as Adena Springs Farm, Madaket Stable, Sam-Son Farm, and West Point Thoroughbreds. Gabby Gaudet, riding for the Racing Analysts, will be aboard Maryland-bred millionaire Eighttofasttocatch. Last year, “Catcher” was ridden by his racetrack trainer, Tim Keefe, a member of the victorious Trainers squad. Gaudet, who grew up in a Maryland racing family, exercised Thoroughbreds throughout high school and college, and galloped horses for Keefe in the mornings before classes at Towson University. “Ironically, it was still when Eighttofasttocatch was in training, and I wasn’t allowed to get on him,” she said with a laugh. The 12-year-old gelding now competes in eventing with Keefe’s daughter Ryan and is trained by his wife, Rumsey, who has been helping Gaudet get in some practice at the Keefes’ farm. “Catcher is so good at what he does,” Gaudet said. “He’s an old pro, so I’m blessed to have a horse underneath me that will take care of me.” She will be riding against her sister, Lacey, a member of the Trainers team, and although sibling rivalry provides some motivation, her main goal is just to make it around safely. “That’s gonna be in the back of my mind – trying to beat my sister, because we are very competitive – but at the same time, we’re very supportive,” she said. Maggie Wolfendale Morley, who has worked with Gaudet on telecasts for the New York Racing Association, will also be riding against a family member: Her husband, Tom Morley, is on the Trainers team. She will be piloting her own horse, Yeager, and was initially prepping for the Real Rider Cup in their barn at Belmont Park. “I was putting a 2-by-4 on two buckets and we were jumping that, but I started to panic incredibly, considering that I haven’t had him through a course,” she said. So she moved Yeager to Thomas’s School of Horsemanship, a hunter-jumper stable on Long Island, for a few lessons and practice sessions. Both analysts like their squad’s chances but see a major threat coming from the Owners. They singled out Mike Balaz, who will represent Canada’s Sam-Son Farm aboard Harmony Bay, part of last year’s winning Trainers team. Maggie Kimmitt, who is co-organizing the event with Anita Motion, the wife of trainer Graham Motion, agreed. “I’d say that Mike Balaz and Jack Fisher would have to be considered the morning-line favorites. Mike’s in his mid-20s and has been riding competitively since he was about 6,” she said, adding that Fisher was an “incredibly successful” steeplechase jockey before turning to training. The Real Rider Cup, which benefits the Retired Racehorse Project and the nonprofit Plantation Field, grew out of a collaboration of Steuart Pittman, the former executive director of the RRP; Anita Motion; and locally based eventer Phillip Dutton, who won individual bronze in the 2016 Olympics. Last year the RRC raised more than $20,000, and Kimmitt said that they had already received more than $41,000. Jen Roytz, who took over from Pittman as executive director of the RRP in February, said that having a new lineup of riders each year is part of a strategy to keep the Real Rider Cup fresh and evolving. “This event is aimed at creating synergy between the racing and equestrian world, and by fielding a new group of riders each year, we can reach more people in the racing world and give them the opportunity to take part,” she said. The Plantation Field International will be live-streamed Friday-Sunday on the USEF Network, https://www.usef.org/network/coverage/2018plantation/. There is a Fan Promo Code of plantation18. The Real Rider Cup will be held in the main arena during the lunch break between the two-star and three-star cross-country divisions on Sunday, starting around 11:30 a.m.