Hong Kong – With no Canadian medals to date in these Olympic Games, pressure is mounting on Canadian equestrian show jumpers, who begin competitions Friday evening in Hong Kong and are considered to be in medal contention. 40-year-old Eric Lamaze, of Schomberg, Ontario, is an Individual medal favourite with his great stallion, Hickstead. Sports Illustrated pegged Canada for the Team bronze and Lamaze for the individual bronze. Lamaze is ranked number-three on the world rider rankings. The world’s number-two rider is not competing at the Olympics, due to a broken leg.
Joining Lamaze will be 61-year-old Ian Millar, of Perth, Ontario, on In Style. Millar will become the world’s second nine-time Olympian and the oldest-ever Olympic show jumper. Millar has the latter honour here by a narrow margin. 60-year-old, first-time Olympian Laurie Lever will contest the show jumping for Australia. Lever is Millar’s junior by just 10 months. Millar will be looking for his first Olympic medal, although he has come within mere fractions of a team bronze on three occasions.
Also joining Millar and Lamaze will be last year’s Pan American individual gold medalist 45-year-old Jill Henselwood, of Oxford Mills, Ontario, on Special Ed. Henselwood will be looking to make history by being one of the few women to stand on the Olympic individual show jumping medal podium. Although women were first admitted to Olympic show jumping in 1952, only 4 women have earned individual medals, and no woman has earned the individual gold medal. Henselwood will face stiff competition from Germany’s Meredith Michaels Beerbaum and American Beezie Madden.
Rounding out Canada’s squad is Mac Cone, of King City, Ontario, on Ole. The same four riders, with Cone on a different mount, claimed team silver at last year’s Pan American Games. In addition to the team silver and Henselwood’s individual gold, Lamaze won the individual bronze.
Friday’s competition is the first qualifier for the individual medal final. It’s outcome also determines the order in which nations will jump in the team competition. The team competition takes place over two days, the 17th and 18th. A team must be in the top-8, including ties for 8th place, to return on the second day of team competition. Individual scores from the team competition will be added to scores from Friday’s qualifier to determine which riders will advance to the individual medal final on the 21st. The top 35 entries, including ties, from approximately 75 original starters, will advance to the two-round individual final. No more than 3 competitors from one nation may advance.
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