Our team has finished in 12th place in the FEI Jumping Nations Cup™ held overnight in Prague. The competition, comprising of 13 nations each of 4 combinations, with only the best three scores counting towards the total, was won by The Netherlands, with an almost flawless display, made all the more impressive as they only went into the competition with the minimum of three combinations.

In warm sunny conditions and in front of a large crowd, Bruce Goodin was our first rider, partnering with his top horse Backatorps Danny V. They successfully navigated the first half of the course but took a series of rails during the second half to finish with 12 penalties.

On the second cycle through the competing nations, Richard Garner and the gelding Calisto 5 hit the course. Like Goodin and Backatorps Danny V before them, they were perfect through the first half, however two rails during the second half of the course saw them finish on eight.

At the half way point through the first round, several of the leading team had seen both combinations go clear, and a strong performance from our remaining riders was going to be necessary to ensure that we scrambled into the top eight nations to qualify for the second round.

Next out was Tom Tarver and his grey gelding, Popeye. With the pressure on and really needing a clear round, Tarver and Popeye almost achieved this, taking just a single rail at the last. Unfortunately, by now, it was looking like only some disastrous fourth rides by some of the other countries would allow us into the top eight.

Our last pair was Daniel Meech and his grey mare, Cinca 3, who incurred a single time penalty and took a rail to finish on a total of five penalties.

With Goodin’s score of 12 being dropped, the boys finished on a total of 17, which was not good enough to qualify for the second round, as Slovakia also missed out with a slow score of eight.

The team had to watch on as the top 8 battled it out with The Netherlands ultimately prevailing, over Ireland and Japan. No doubt the team have benefitted from the experience and we will be back to fight another day.

A brief listing of results appears below. For the detailed results, please click HERE