What do you do when you have a country’s hopes and your own individual ambitions at stake then you fall off your horse in front of millions of people? You get up, make sure your horse is okay and you feel like rubbish. Then you get on with life.
Let’s look on the bright side. Our dressage performance was very good, none of the Australian horses or riders was hurt on cross country day and the fact is that we all know that this is a tough game. As Shane Rose, who suffered his own Olympic setback even before the Games started, said “We have to get used to disappointment in our sport”.
Also on a bright note Chris Burton did an amazing job on cross country day, went into the Team showjumping in the top ten and finished in ninth place in the Teams competition. Lucinda and Flying Finish jumped a lovely clear show jumping round with only one time fault and, although Andrew had a couple of rails on Rutherglen in the Team jumping, he bounced around the Individual for a clear round and was the highest placed Australian individual in 13th place
Michael Jung has soared to new heights Photo: Kit Houghton/FEI
Michael Jung said yesterday that he was “going out for dinner with my family to get some new power for tomorrow”. To paraphrase the restaurant scene in “When Harry Met Sally”, I’d like to have some of whatever he ate last night. Today is his 30th birthday and he is celebrating both that and the fact that he is the first person to be the concurrent World, European and Olympic champion. You don’t get any better than that. Although apparently he dabbles in Grand Prix dressage too so maybe there is another title he can add in the future.
Very smart silver medallists, Team GB Photo: Kit Houghton/FEI
I’m glad to see that the British riders have stuck to wearing traditional hunting-type hats for showjumping. Germany certainly deserve their gold team medals (and Ingrid Klimke deserves a special medal for withdrawing Butts Abraxxas from the Individual jumping) but Team GB deserves a gold medal for turnout as well as their silver medal for eventing performance (was it my imagination or were the medals particularly large?). And although I adore Sandra Auffarth and admire her huge talent, I can almost hear Alison shouting from Australia "Put your pony tail in a hair net!"
No doubt there will be celebration in the German, British, New Zealand and Swedish camps tonight but everyone who competed in this event deserves recognition. I’ve simply been watching on the sidelines and writing a few notes and I’m exhausted so the stress and pressure on the riders, their owners, grooms, team managers and Uncle Tom Cobbley and all must be huge. As Australia didn’t do very well there will probably be all sorts of hullabaloo and certainly there should be considered analysis. But before that onslaught I hope they all get a chance to have a large drink and time with friends and family to celebrate what they did achieve, rather than what they didn’t.
It isn’t what we hoped for but that’s life. In the words of Winston Churchill
“Success is not final; failure is not fatal; it is the courage to continue that counts”
Tomorrow is changeover day for the horses with no competition but we’ll be back in the arena at Greenwich for the Individual and Team Dressage Grand Prix competition on Thursday. As we’ve got a day off competition we’re taking the opportunity to visit Newmarket – the home of racing in England, so a slight change of pace tomorrow.
