Team, Open

Although Germany had won World Championship gold in 2022, Great Britain had won the European title in 2023 and, in the Olympic year, could regularly provide half of the riders in the top 10 of the FEI world rankings. Indeed, the British had strength enough to leave World Champion Yasmin Ingham, European Championship silver winner Kitty King, and the recently deposed as #1 world ranking Oliver Townend, off the team.

Britain cemented their place as favorites by outscoring the German team in the dressage phase, which had historically been Germany’s outstanding discipline, and then, when the riders went out onto the cross-country course, German hopes were ended when Christoph Wahler was unseated from his horse. Great Britain thought they had only accumulated 0.8 penalties on the cross-country phase, but after Ros Canter had finished her efforts, a judge reported the horse had taken out a flag at fence #21 and added 15 penalties to her score, thereby reducing the lead over France from a healthy margin of 20 penalties to a slim 5. The British management filed an appeal based on video evidence that allegedly showed it was the rider’s knee (which would not count as a penalty) that struck the flag, not the horse, but this film was ruled inadmissible by the FEI.

Tom McEwen’s clear round in the show jumping proved decisive as the Britons extended their led over France to successfully retain their Olympic title. Japan excelled over the last two phases of the event to win their first Olympic equestrian medal since Takeichi Nishi won the individual show jumping gold in 1932. Belgium originally placed fourth but their team was subsequently disqualified after a positive doping test on Tine Magnus’ mount, Dia van het Lichterveld.