There were heartbreaking scenes in Tokyo as a German had a gold medal ripped away from her as the use of horses became a hot topic.
A debate has erupted over distressing scenes in the modern pentathlon on Friday night, after some athletes’ campaigns were ruined by poor show jumping routines.
The unique event sees athletes compete across five disciplines: fencing, swimming, running, shooting and horse riding.
Show jumping is arguably the most difficult component because athletes don’t ride their own horses. Instead, they are assigned a horse they first meet about 20 minutes before the event, and need to try to cajole it into hopping over obstacles.
However, not all the animals wanted to play ball. German Annika Schleu, who finished fourth in Rio, was in tears as her horse went rogue, unable to convince it to get around the course and over any jumps.
Schleu was in the lead heading into the equestrian event but it wasn’t long before her hopes of Olympic glory were ripped away. Her horse appeared spooked as it entered the arena and didn’t respond to her instructions. Schleu didn’t register any points and crashed to last place.
Former British pentathlete Heather Fell said in commentary for the BBC Schleu was living a “real life nightmare”.
“This is hard to watch, hard to commentate on,” Fell added.
Natalya Coyle of Ireland suffered a similar fate. Placed fourth heading into the show jumping, her horse baulked at several jumps and she fell to 19th.
“It’s really disappointing,” said Coyle.
“It’s not how I wanted to end my career.
“I suppose it’s just added disappointment because to be third in events and to be so close and to feel like it’s a bit snatched away from you, it’s really disappointing.
“That’s pentathlon, unfortunately. I knew it was going to be tough when I watched the first rider not get around so I knew that was really tough.
“I thought I had made a good plan and it worked a lot in the arena but he just didn’t want to go near it.
“One of the fences beforehand, it was my fault – I should have checked before. But I thought it was all going OK and then it (the horse) stopped and then it stopped again.”
Kate French (Great Britain) won gold, Laura Asadauskaite (Lithuania) won silver and Sarolta
Kovacs (Hungary) claimed bronze.
‘Beyond cruel’: Olympic dreams crushed
Some people online lamented how tough it is for riders to bond with a horse in such a short amount of time, and how cruel the results can be when it doesn’t go to plan.
Journalist Jason Keen tweeted: “Imagine: You come 4th in Rio, you go again, train so hard, ‘Tokyo will be my Games’. The big day comes and it’s going brilliantly, you have one of the biggest leads in Olympics history. And then a random horse ruins your dream. Crushing for Annika Schleu.”
Nick Holder wrote: “That show jumping element of the pentathlon is nuts. Twenty minutes to bond with a horse. Ridiculous. That poor German girl given an apparently distressed horse and losing a big overall lead. Stupid.”
Charlie Beckett said: “Watching someone’s Olympic dreams snatched away from them just because a random horse doesn’t want to go round a course is absolutely heartbreaking. Modern pentathlon is absolutely brutal.”
Irish sports presenter Jacqui Hurley weighed in on Coyle’s situation, saying she drew a horse who just didn’t “fancy it today”.
“And that is the horrendous luck of this draw. Crazy event. She went into showjumping in 4th & leaves it in 19th. Beyond cruel,” Hurley tweeted.
Broadcaster Niall McGrath wrote: “The pentathlon is absolutely brutal in the Olympics. How can you not feel for the competitors when the horses don’t co-operate, years of work down the drain – total lottery.”
‘They shouldn’t do this to the horse’
However, others said it was disturbing to see how riders treated their horses when they didn’t respond to their commands, and found it uncomfortable when horse and rider clearly didn’t gel.
Some were upset at Schleu’s constant whipping of her horse when it wouldn’t do as she liked.
Journalist Rachel McArthur tweeted: “Don’t make me start on the way some of them are handling the horses.”
Sports writer Mitch Goldich wrote: “Kinda makes you think they shouldn’t do this to the horses, who are led to jump over fences with strangers on them.”