India’s Fouaad Mirza and Seigneur Medicott will participate in the final stage of equestrian eventing – show jumping – on Monday to make it to the medal round of the event in Tokyo Olympics.
Of the 51 rider-horse pairs that remain, only the top 25 (including those tied for 25th place) will make it to the eventing final, where a second round of show jumping will decide the podium in the discipline at Tokyo 2020.
Mirza currently stands in 22nd position with 39.20 points. While breaking into the top 25 will be a hard task, a perfect routine in show jumping might help. The pair’s biggest hurdle, given its points at the moment, is that almost all the top-ranked riders (many of whom are regular show jumpers) feature ahead of him on the leader board.
However, anything can happen at the venue as one saw in the cross country stage with Germany’s double gold medallist Michael Jung. Despite a good run through the course, Chipmunk amassed penalties on the obstacles which pushed him from the summit of the standings to 10th place.
Here’s a quick look at how Fouaad and Medicott performed in the first two rounds:
Round one: Dressage
Mirza and Medicott finished the dressage stage of equestrian eventing at the Tokyo Olympics placed ninth on Saturday. The pair had amassed 28.00 penalty points in dressage on Friday, breaking into the top 10 at sixth position. The pair eventually ended the day tied seventh with Sweden’s Louise Romeike and her horse Cato 60 on points (28.00), before ending at ninth after the third and final session. In dressage, lower the penalty score, higher the rider and horse place in the standings.
Mirza and Medicott placed ninth in a 62-pair field (one less than the original 63 after Austria’s Katrin Khoddam-Hazrati withdrew from the event.
Round two: Cross country
After finishing the dressage phase of equestrian eventing in an impressive ninth place, Mirza and Seigneur Medicott stand in 22nd place after completing the cross country course with 11.20 points on Sunday.
Mirza and Medicott finished just outside the permitted 7:45 minute mark, completing the course in 8.13 seconds to amass 11.20 penalty points.
Medicott was sublime on the jumps but exceeded the time limit by 35 seconds and incurred the penalty points.
Who leads the standings now?
| Rider-Horse | Country | Score |
| Oliver Townend, Ballaghmor Class | Great Britain | 23.60 |
| Julia Krajewki, Amanda De B’Neville | Germany | 25.60 |
| Laura Collett, London 52 | Great Britain | 25.80 |
| Tim Prince, Vitali | New Zealand | 26.80 |
| Kazuma Tomoto, Vinci de la Vigne | Japan | 27.50 |
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SCORING GUIDE: The simple way to understand equestrian scoring is to literally focus on the errors. The more errors you make, the higher you score in penalty points. Higher your penalty points, lower your points. In dressage, rider and horse is judged on how they perform the set routine. Four overall attributes are looked for – freedom and regularity of the paces, impulsion of the horse, submission of the horse and position and form of the rider. Three judges give their individual score, and an average is drawn. This average is then subtracted from 100 and multiplied by 1.5. Fouaad scored 28.00 penalty points in the dressage stage. In cross-country, riders get a 0.4 penalty point for every second they exceed beyond the allowed time. Points are also deducted for any errors in jumping over the obstacles on the errors. Zero is the perfect score for cross country. Fouaad and Medicott scored 11.20 penalty points after exceeding the time limit. They took 8.13 seconds to complete the course, despite a perfect run with no obstacle penalties. In show jumping, rider-horse pairs are penalized for each second they exceed beyond the optimum time. If they exceed the limit set, they are automatically disqualified. Disobedience of the horse, a fall for either horse, rider or both results in point deductions and eliminations respectively. |
Where to watch
Equestrian eventing is being telecast live on the Sony Sports Network and can be streamed on Sony Liv.
What time does Fouaad Mirza ride in show jumping?
Show jumping in equestrian eventing at the Tokyo Olympics is set to begin at 1.30pm IST.