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Sark-born dressage rider Carl Hester, and his co-owned Jersey horse, Nip Tuck – which he sometimes calls Barney - are back in Olympic action in Rio today.
On Friday, Hester, together with fellow team-mates Charlotte Dujardin, Fiona Bigwood, and Spencer Wilton, picked up a silver medal.
At the London games in 2012 he won gold in the same event.
If he secures another medal today he’ll become the most decorated Channel Island Olympian ever.
At the moment he’s on a par with Jersey-born Simon Laurens. He won a gold in the team dressage, and a silver in the individual freestyle grade III event at the 2008 Paralympics in Beijing.
Only one other Channel Islander has won an Olympic medal. That was Guernsey-born athlete Percy Hodge who picked up gold in the 3,000m steeplechase in the 1920 summer Olympics in Antwerp.
There are three stages to the dressage in the Olympics. They help produce both the team and the individual medals.
The first is the Grand Prix. How well competitors do in this dictates the order in which they compete in the second event – the Grand Prix Special – with the best going last. The scores from both events are added together, and the results of the best three members of four–person team are added together. The team with the most points wins.
The results this time round: Gold for Germany with 81.936 points, silver for Great Britain with 78.595, and bronze for the United States with 76.667.
The best 18 competitors after the first two events go through to the final event, the Grand Prix Freestyle. This dictates the individual medals. Hester qualified for today’s competition in ninth place. But, the only benefit this has is the order in which they’ll be competing. Again the best going last, and having the benefit of knowing how well the others have done. The scores of the previous competitions are wiped clean. So, whoever does best on the day wins.
Commenting on Facebook after winning his first medal at this games Hester posted “Barney, the silver is yours just as much as it’s mine!”
Hester got through to this stage at the last Olympics in London and narrowly missed out on an individual medal coming fifth. This time he’ll no doubt be hoping to go at least two better, and ride his way into the history books.
Hester will be competing at 15:35, and the medals will be decided after the last competitor takes to the arena at 17:20.
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