Even in the drizzling rain, the crowds at Versailles cooed in awe of Great Britain’s Laura Collett and London 52 after a spectacular dressage test on day one of three-day eventing competition at the 2024 Paris Olympic Games.
Collett, 34, made history Saturday when the judges rewarded her a record-shattering score of 17.5 for their efforts.
American legend David O’Connor was the previous record holder, with an impressive 19.3 dressage score with Custom Made on his way to winning individual gold at the 2000 Sydney Olympic Games.
EquiRatings has pegged Collett as the rider with the best chances to win in Paris with 37% odds. Teammate Rosalind Canter is right behind her with a 16% chance.
“I loved every second of it. That horse is unbelievable. What he’s done throughout my whole career is amazing and he just keeps on delivering. I’m just very, very grateful to him. He really went for it and smashed it out the park, so he gave me that motivation to not leave anything behind and just be brave and try to give it our best shot,” Collett said after her performance.
“Tom (McEwen) and I were lucky to get that feeling of what it is like standing on a podium with a gold medal around our necks [in Tokyo], and we sure want to do it again,” she continued. “Yes, there’s a lot of pressure and expectations, but pressure is a privilege.”
British and German event riders have won the last five Olympic Games. And Germany isn’t going to make it easy for the Brits, who are forecast to be the strongest team in contention for a gold medal this year (and are defending their 2021 Tokyo gold medal finish).
Michael Jung and Chipmunk FRH were hot on Collett’s heels, scoring 17.8. Mainstay equestrian sport commentator John Kyle called the .30 difference “basically nothing” as Jung left the ring in the pouring rain.
EquiRatings has Jung at a 15% chance of winning it all.
Tied for third after dressage competition was veteran rider from Australia, Christopher Burton on Shadow Man and Alex Hua Tian from China with Jilsonne Van Bareelhof. Both rider and horse pairs scored a 22.
Great Britain leads after dressage, with Germany in second and France in third in the team rankings. New Zealand sits in fourth and Japan in fifth. The United States is in sixth.
Prior to Paris, only two riders have ever delivered a sub-20 dressage score at an Olympic Games, according to EquiRatings. O’Connor, of course, and French eventer Nicolas Touzaint on a 19.6 score at the 2004 Athens Games, which helped him secure an 8th place finish.
American riders put in solid performances to keep them well in the mix going into cross-country. Liz Halliday secured a score of 28 on Nutcracker, marking her debut in an Olympic Games, to sit in 19th. Caroline Pamukcu and HSH Blake were the first Americans to make it down centerline to score 30.4, putting them in 25th place. Boyd Martin and Fedarman B scored a 30.5 after some trouble with the flying changes to be 26th.
“Awesome test except for two moments that were disastrous. It’s a shame, I’ve probably done twenty thousand flying changes in the last two months but today wasn’t my day in the flying change department,” Martin said of “Bruno” after his test. “Other than the flying change, I think it’s our best work ever. The atmosphere is a little electric out there. I felt like I gave it my all. I felt like we still came out of it with a very respectable score.”
Italian rider Emiliano Portale was eliminated Saturday after stewards found blood in the mouth of his mount, Future.
Catch up on the full results after day one of eventing here.
Next up:
Cross-country competition will begin at 10:30 a.m. start GMT+2 / 4:30 a.m. – 9 a.m. EST Sunday.
The Paris 2024 course designer is Pierre le Goupil, who is also responsible for the 2023 European Championships course. There are 28 fences with 45 efforts, for a total length of 5,149 meters and an optimum time of 9:02.
* For U.S. viewers, all Olympic coverage is available via NBC or Peaco*ck.
The Olympic format:
The Paris Games is a 5-star short test, which runs over three days. Individual and team competitions run during the same schedule. Three members make up a team with no drop score.
The top 25 individual riders qualify to compete in a second show jumping round (which takes place after the team show jumping round), which will determine individual scoring. That means top 25 riders who are also on a team will jump twice on the last day of competition.
On Monday, July 29:
Show Jumping Team: 11 a.m. GMT+2 / 5 a.m. – 7 a.m. EST
Show Jumping Individual (top 25): 3 p.m. GMT+2 / 9 a.m. – 10 a.m. EST
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