United States Eventing Association

Fast Facts: 2024 Paris Olympic Games

Bonjour! The sport of eventing kicks off equestrian competition at the 2024 Paris Olympics Games tomorrow. We have rounded up everything you need to know from schedules (and time conversions!), competitor information, livestream details, and so much more in this week’s very special edition of Fast Facts.

The Field:

• The nations with teams include Australia, Belgium, Brazil, Canada, France, Germany, Great Britain, Ireland, Italy, the Netherlands, New Zealand, Poland, Sweden, Switzerland, and the U.S.
• Those nations with individual representation are Austria, China, the Czech Republic, Ecuador, Finland, Hungary, Morocco, Portugal, South Africa, and Spain.
• You can see the full list of definite entries here.

• Taking a deep dive into the 81 horses competing you will find 60 geldings, 20 mares, and one stallion on the roster.
• It is important to note that due to Olympic regulations regarding sponsorships, some horses will have certain prefixes or suffixes removed from their name.
  • Examples include Caroline Powell’s entry Greenacres Special Cavalier will be called Special Cavalier.
  • Kevin McNab’s Scuderia 1918 Don Quidam will be called Don Quidam.
  • Liz Halliday’s Cooley Nutcracker will be referred to as Nutcracker.
• Two of the riders entered in the Games this year are just 24 years old: Finland’s individual entry Veer Manninen and Switzerland’s team rider Nadja Minder.
• Ecuador’s Ronald Zabala Goetschel is the most senior rider in the field this year at 57 years old.
  
  
• At the Tokyo Games, the Selle Français was the most popular breed, and the French are still strongly represented this year with 13 of the entered horses being registered with the Selle Français studbook.
  
• 47 of the riders are male and 34 are female.
• The oldest horse this year is the 21-year-old Oldenburg gelding Forever Young Wundermaske (Weltbekannt x Deer Rose) ridden by Goetschel, who is representing Ecuador as an individual. Forever Young Wundermaske is co-owned by Goetschel and Fernando Villacis and Fabian Zabala.
• In terms of the youngest horse in the field, two horses take home that title. The Irish Sport Horse gelding HSH Blake (Tolan R x Doughiska Lass), ridden by U.S. rider Caroline Pamukcu and co-owned by Pamukcu, Sherrie Martin, Mollie Hoff, and Deniz Pamukcu, and the Luxmbourg Warmblood gelding Figaro Des Premices (Quidam de Revel x Acapela de Kreisker), owned and ridden by South African individual rider Alexander Peternell, are just 9 this year.
  
  

• Popular sires amongst this year’s Olympic field include
  • Diamant de Semilly (Dia VanHet Lictherveld Z, Viamant du Matz)
  • Diarado (JL Dublin, Radar Love, Hiarado, Diabolo)
  • Jaguar Mail (Ferreolus Lat, Colorado Blue, Box Leo)
  • Numero Uno (El Mundo, Nickel)
  • Quidam de Revel (Champ de Tailleur, Figaro Des Premices)
  • Tolan R (HSH Blake, Nutcracker).

• While the Selle Français is the most represented breed this year, the majority of the equine entries trace back to Germany.
• There is one U.S.-bred in contention in Goestchel's Forever Young Wundermaske.
  

The Facts:

• The President of the Ground Jury is Christina Klingspor (Sweden), assisted by Xavier LeSauce (France) and Robert Stevenson (USA).
• George Bazar (Hungary) was appointed as the Chief Steward.
• Serving as the Technical Delegate is Marcin Konarski (Poland). Konarski will be assisted by France's Gaston Bileitczuk.
• The cross-country course has been designed by France's own Pierre Le Goupil.
• The show jumping course will be designed by Santiago Varela (Spain) and Gregory Bodo (France).
• View a full list of officials here.

The Format:

Only three riders will compete for a team and there is no drop score. However, there is an opportunity to substitute a horse and rider.

The traveling reserve must pass both horse inspections, and they can be subbed into the competition up to two hours before the dressage phase begins, with no penalty to the team. The horse that the reserve replaces then becomes the new team reserve. So, what happens next?

• If all of the combinations make it through all three phases, their scores are combined, and they get a team score.
• If a combination doesn't complete the dressage phase, 100 penalty points are added to the overall team score.
• If a combination doesn't complete the cross-country phase, 200 penalty points are added to the overall team score.

At this point, the team has a few choices:

1. They can bring the reserve combination in and keep the penalties acquired from the incompletion, plus 20 more penalties for bringing in the reserve. Whatever penalties that reserve accumulates will also be added to the team's final score.
2. OR, the team can bypass the substitution and bring the eliminated or retired pair back into the competition with the non-completion penalties added to the score. There are exceptions to this if the horse suffers from an injury, disqualification, horse fall, or if the rider gets penalized because of unsafe or abusive riding. At this point, a substitution is also not allowed.

Only one substitution can be made per team, and it must be both horse AND rider. Substitutes made overnight between phases will only inquire 20 penalties. Only riders that compete in all three phases are eligible for individual medals.

How to Watch:

The livestream for the Olympics this year is offered through NBC and its streaming service Peacock. According to NBC's website:

Every day during the Summer Olympics, NBC will offer fans at least nine hours of daytime coverage of the Games’ most exciting events, including live finals coverage of swimming, gymnastics, track and field, and more. Considering the time difference (Paris is six hours ahead of the U.S.’s eastern time zone), fans will be able to watch the day’s most popular events live on NBC in the morning and afternoon. NBC will also deliver an enhanced Olympics primetime show each night, providing three hours of must-see entertainment.

In addition, every event from the Summer Olympics will be broadcast live on Peacock, which will be home to an innovative Olympics hub that will include "curated rails of live and upcoming events, dedicated in-depth hubs for nearly 40 sports, medal standings and an interactive schedule."

You can sign up for a Peacock account for $7.99 a month or $79.99 annually.

The Schedule:

Saturday, July 27
3:30 a.m. ET / 2:30 a.m. CT / 12:30 a.m. PT: Eventing: Dressage Team & Individual, Part 1
8:00 a.m. ET / 7:00 a.m. CT / 5:00 a.m. PT: Eventing: Dressage Team & Individual, Part 2

Sunday, July 28
4:30 a.m. ET / 3:30 a.m. CT / 1:30 a.m. PT: Eventing: Cross-Country Team & Individual

Monday, July 29
5:00 a.m. ET / 4:00 a.m. CT / 2:00 a.m. PT: Eventing: Jumping Team & Individual (Final)

Helpful Links

• Website
• Schedule
• Definite Entries
• Ride Times
• Live Scores
• USEA Coverage

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