- 18 Aug 08, 06:44 AM
Thank goodness for a bit of R and R, after being told categorically last night that John Whitaker was out of the Games, he's now looking like he might be back in the team.
John rode Peppermill this morning and reported the stallion to be feeling a lot better.
The team only need to count three scores from each round so they managed joint
fourth without him but their job in tonight's final round would certainly be made easier with all four to choose from.
John is their anchorman and is generally regarded as
one of the greatest horsemen in the world.
Good luck boys, if you win a medal here it will be a remarkable achievement. We'll find out later on if John will jump. The final rounds start from 1215 BST and I think it's going to be an absolute corker.
Any one of six nations could realistically bag gold. Although from looking at the top jumpers last night I think it'll be the Americans again. They just look on really good form.
By the way, did anyone notice how tough the water jump was? That was the hardest water fence I've ever seen - 4.2m wide (so about normal size) yet it was just a few strides on a left-hand angle from a big vertical. It was virtually impossible for anyone without a super-scopy horse to clear, which is why something like 25 of the first 35 riders landed a foot in it.
The design was spooky as well and one rider early on couldn't get his horse anywhere near it!
I thought Li Zhenqiang, one of the Chinese team, had the best idea when he took his horse round to the right after the vertical so as to get the maximum run up.
I guess it should be tough though, and as Michael Whitaker said to me when he joined me on BBC Radio 5 Live again, "This is the Olympics, the fences are always a bit different."
Throughout these blogs, I haven't mentioned anything about Hong Kong and that's because there's been so much sport to chat about.
But I must mention something I saw yesterday which made me a bit homesick. There's a group of oldies here called the "joyful arts club" who gather along the side of the Shing Mun river every now and again to do what I can only describe as bad "street karaoke".
About 15 of them, mostly missing their teeth and certainly all well into their 70s sit around taking it in turns to warble Chinese pop songs into the mic.
Apart from the singing quality, it's all very professional with a screen for the lyrics and an amplifier pumping out the backing track.
There's even a man playing the saxophone, slightly out of time but he was enjoying himself. In fact everyone was enjoying themselves. Their crinkled little faces looked so contented.
It made me feel happy to be alive but also as I say, a tad homesick.
In my village we have regular, impromptu karaoke sessions courtesy of Lloyd. The age range is a lot lower, we all have our own teeth and we don't tend to have them on the side of the brook!
But they are mostly al fresco and I'm sure the surrounding houses think we sound as bad as the "joyful arts club."
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Enjoyed the blog today, Lizzie - thanks!
On a different note, can I urge any dressage fans to read the article online that was printed in Saturday's Guardian entitled 'Olympics: Ballroom Dancing For Horses Is So Out Of Step' (the title being the least offensive thing contained in the article).
I have never read anything so poorly researched, one-eyed and biased. The journalist blatantly accuses the sport of being cruel and portrays the horses competing as being like 'the dancing bears in those charity ads'.
If you feel as strongly as I did, please email the paper and complain!
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Oh no, another uninformed journalist looking a) for an angle, and b) to provoke...
On a lighter note, take a look at the BOA Team GB profile of John Whitaker - according to them he is a rhythmic gymnast, born 1886...!
I hope they sort their website out in
time for 2012.
http://www.olympics.org.uk/athleterecord.aspx?at=5119
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Stunned this article is not jam packed with horsey types complaining about lack of Olympian spirit shown by all teams other than 1 in protesting about John Whittaker taking part in the 2nd round of the Showjumping.
Can we know the one team who didnt complain please?
This is thrown into sharp relief by the actions of the Croats in donating a boat to the Dutch to enable them to take part in the sailing medal race - although one team did protest about that.
I always thought the equestrian world was better than that, it always seemed one of the few sports where a genuine "sporting" atitude still existed. I know the reasons why they protested, but it doesnt bear much scrutiny. Tim Stockdale said shame on them, quite right - name and shame please.
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I guess they were interpreting the rules literally - ie you had to qualify to be compete in the final round. I guess people were scared that Whitaker was just too good.
These are the same rules that let a competitor from Hong Kong compete, even though this has not been permitted in any other sports.
Ironically, Whitaker couldnt have saved them in the end. Oh well, there's always the individuals, and 2012...
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Has anyone watched the showjumping in the modern pentathlon at all? I was alarmed by how unsafe it looked for the horses. I do hope they are as carefully monitored by vets as the more expensive ones we have enjoyed watching in the pure equestrian sports. I stopped watching after a grey horse called Choochoo or some sort of name seemed to go lame halfway through after crashing into a fence. The course is very wet and it just looks like an accidnet waiting to happen as although some of the horses jump fine, others just crash their way through the fences. I'd have posted on one of their blogs but they are all closed to comment. I had thought it might be an interesting sport to follow, but after watching that I am just concerned about the horses.
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