THE Olympic year of 2024 began with Ireland as the number one team in the world and high hopes of medals in Paris. It ended without realising that Olympic dream, but with the number one team ranking still intact and with seven senior Irish riders in the top 50 and six young stars in the U25 top 50 in the world.
During another exceptional 12 months, Team Ireland posted two victories and a total of eight podium placings in five-star Nations Cups. And, with seven more senior Nations Cup wins across three and four-star level, along with 30 podium finishes in five-star Grands Prix and World Cup classes - including 11 wins - consistency and competitiveness were in plentiful supply.
The high-point of the year was the five-star Nations Cup victory on the hallowed ground of Aachen (GER) in July, while Daniel Coyle and the mare Legacy were the standout partnership as they blazed a trail with a string of extraordinary performances that saw them showered with accolades by year-end.
Momentum
The momentum on the path to Paris had been boosted by historic team silver at the European Championships in Milan (ITA) last year. So, when Daniel Coyle and Legacy got 2024 off to a flying start with back-to-back World Cup wins in Leipzig (GER) and Amsterdam (NED) in January, just a few weeks after snatching the Grand Prix honours at the London International Horse Show, the mood in the Irish camp was very definitely optimistic.
In six months’ time, the gates of the Chateau de Versailles in Paris would open to equestrian sport, and the Olympic dream would come alive once again…
Runner-up spot at the first leg of the brand new Longines League of Nations (LLN) series in Abu Dhabi (UAE) in February kicked off a season, in which the Irish found themselves in what team manager Michael Blake described as “a ding-dong battle” with Team Germany, who took the honours that day. “You’re never in a bad place when you’re on their coat-tails, let’s be honest!” Blake pointed out.
Victory at the second LLN leg in Ocala (USA) in March was followed by another runner-up spot behind Germany at the Rolex show in Rome (ITA) in May. And when the third LLN leg in St Gallen (SUI) was called off due to adverse weather conditions, there was only the final qualifier in Rotterdam (NED) remaining at the end of June.
That wasn’t Ireland’s day, with an eighth-place finish, but two weeks later it all came right in Aachen.
Emphatic
It was an emphatic win clinched by a zero scoreline. With an unfavourable first-to-go draw with Vistogrand, Denis Lynch was the only Irish team member to fault, when Bertram Allen and Pacino Amiro (ISH), Shane Sweetnam and James Kann Cruz (ISH) and Cian O’Connor with Fancy de Kergane went clear in that order. And when Lynch was foot-perfect second time out, O’Connor didn’t even have to return to the ring, because Allen and Sweetnam once again made no mistake and it was all done and dusted.
It was a spectacular result from the same four riders who won the European Championship title in Gothenburg (SWE) back in 2017, two of whom - O’Connor and Lynch - were also on the last Irish side to reign supreme in Aachen in 2010. This was Ireland’s sixth win at the mecca of show jumping, the first posted way back in 1937.
Sweetnam described the victory as “the stuff that dreams are made of”, while O’Connor said he got the same adrenaline rush as he did 14 years earlier - “it gets your blood racing. It’s fantastic to be here!”
Michael Blake said: “It was a great feeling to be able to get this result, I’m very proud for me and for the guys - it meant a lot to all of us. We’ve won plenty of Nations Cups, but we hadn’t won this one for quite a while and it was a bit like winning at Spruce Meadows last year, which we hadn’t done for 20 years, and in Rome last year, where Ireland had never won before. All these results were on the bucket-list for me and we managed to get them done at our first attempt!”
The mighty Aachen result was quickly followed by third placings for the teams at five-star Falsterbo (SWE) and Hickstead (GBR). And then it was on to the Paris 2024 Olympic Games the following month, accompanied by a lot of media hype and great expectations. It seemed anything was possible.
Paris
A clean sheet from Germany saw them take pole position in the first Olympic jumping team competition. The three-per-team format was unforgiving, but Ireland comfortably qualified for the following day’s medal-decider when finishing sixth of the 20 competing countries on a total of nine faults, just a single fault behind Britain, Belgium and The Netherlands, who each ran up an eight-fault tally, while USA filled second spot in this opener.
Sweetnam and James Kann Cruz were first to go for Ireland and had an early oxer down, Coyle and Legacy produced a superb clear and Cian O’Connor and Maurice collected five faults when clipping the middle element of the influential combination on the final line and also picked up a time fault.
The biggest surprise of this first day was the disastrous result of the much-fancied Swiss side, who disappeared from the reckoning with 24 faults, which left them in 12th place and out of contention, because only the top 10 teams would make the cut into the next day.
Sweetnam again opened the Irish account with five faults on the team final afternoon, and Irish hearts fluttered with excitement when Coyle and Legacy produced another sparkling clear. So, not for the first time in his life, O’Connor had the weight of the world on his shoulders, when he rode into the ring as anchorman with Maurice.
He has pulled off the impossible so many times in Nations Cup competitions and a clear round would have kept Ireland in the hunt for a medal placing. But this time around it wasn’t to be, with two fences down and a time fault bringing the team tally to 14, which left them two faults behind Sweden in sixth place.
Britain clinched gold, when Ben Maher, Harry Charles and Scott Brash completed with just two time faults, pinning USA into silver and the hosts from France into bronze.
O’Connor described it as “a tough day”. He said: “We’re at the pinnacle of our sport and it shows the fine lines at this level. We had good plans, but it’s a big arena with very unique fences - my lad has been jumping great all year and today just wasn’t his day, but there’s a lot of people who put so much work in. We’ll dust ourselves down now, we’ve a few days off now and make sure our horses are okay. That’s the main thing - we’ll come again.”
Daniel Coyle and Legacy at the Paris Olympic Games \ Tomas Holcbecher
Irish sweetheart
The Irish were far from finished however, fantastic performances from both James Kann Cruz and Legacy leaving Sweetnam second and Coyle third in the qualifier for the Individual jumping final won by Frenchman Julien Epaillard and Dubai du Cedre three days later, so that gave them a brilliant draw as some of the final starters on the last afternoon.
Sweetnam was thrilled with his fast clear from the 11-year-old grey gelding in the qualifier. “We didn’t really have the rub of the green on Friday (in the team final) actually,” he said. “When I watched the video of my round, it was like he just breathed on that fence. But that’s just show jumping for you. You have to have a little bit of luck, and today we had it on our side!”
Coyle’s Legacy hadn’t touched a pole and was still bouncing around the 14-fence course on day three.“I don’t know what to say about her any more,” he said. “She was really fresh again. She’s 14 now, but her mind doesn’t think it! Obviously, she’s feeling great and in the warm up already I felt that. I was expecting her to be a little tired, but then when she was fresh, I thought, okay, I need to change a little bit how I want to ride her today, otherwise I’ll end up making a mistake,” he said.
He wasn’t feeling great himself, however, because he had food-poisoning and had been ill all of the previous night. “I was under a lot of pressure today in all the wrong ways! But I was just trying to get through the finish with a good score, because after this week, my mare deserves to be in the final no matter what. So I would have been disappointed if she wasn’t there,” he added.
And she did her very best to the very end.
Everyone started on a zero score again in the top-30 showdown on the last day, but the Irish luck ran out with 12 faults for Sweetnam and retirement for Coyle, when the distance to the massive triple bar just a few fences from home just wasn’t there.
“She jumps her heart out every single time for me, and I can’t ask for anything more,” a disappointed Coyle said.
It would come down to a second-round three-way head-to-head, with Germany’s Christian Kukuk and Checker 47 taking gold, ahead of 2012 Olympic champions Switzerland’s Steve Guerdat and his European championship winning mare Dynamix de Belheme in silver, while Dutchman Maikel van der Vleuten clinched his second successive Olympic individual bronze medal with the incredibly consistent Beauville Z.
In the final analysis, Sweetnam finished in 22nd place and Coyle in 26th.
Reflecting
Reflecting on the Games, team manager Blake said “everyone did their very best”.
Looking back on the team event, he said: “We finished close enough after day one and obviously knew that we’d go back on day two and try. The whole team really put everything into it and it wasn’t just for the week before, the months before, some of them had that in a plan for a long, long time.
“But if you’d have told anybody that the three medal-winning teams would be the three medal winners, and that Germany and Ireland and Sweden wouldn’t be in there at the end, and that Switzerland wouldn’t even make it into day two, then they would have said you were crazy. These Games threw up completely different results to what people were expecting,” he pointed out.
“I have no doubt in my mind that Germany and Ireland are the most superior teams in the world at the moment and, if you go through the results for the year that will prove it. But it didn’t work for either of us, and I don’t think Otto (Becker, German team manager) got it wrong either!” he added.
Talking about the two horses that made it to the individual final, he said: “Legacy put in a hard week of it, she’s such a trier and how could you not but love her, she gives everything for Daniel. James Kann Cruz is an incredible horse, he has been great for the Irish team, but he just hadn’t the best time of his life either.
“Obviously, we were hopeful of a much better result all round, but we didn’t get it. We went to the Games with great expectations, built up by a lot of media who said we could win, and we really thought we could do it, but it just didn’t happen.”
Dublin
In Dublin just over a week later, Irish riders were in flying form. Francis Derwin and Parvati AEG won the opening international Speed Stakes, Darragh Kenny topped the Sport Ireland Classic with Chic Chic, Conor Swail and Theo won the Clayton Speed Derby and Daniel Coyle and Incredible won the Cashel Palace Stakes.
The team of Kenny and Cartello, Mark McAuley with GRS Lady Amaro, Denis Lynch with Vistogrand and Cian O’Connor with Fancy de Kergane were runners-up in the Aga Khan Cup, won by the USA when finishing just a single fault ahead of France.
Commandant Geoff Curran won the RDS Stakes with DHF Alliance and, on the final afternoon, McAuley and Lady Amaro were spectacular in the €500,000 Grand Prix, sponsored for the first time by Rolex.
In a thrilling seven-horse jump-off against the clock, the Irishman finished a very close second to Switzerland’s Martin Fuchs and Conner Jei.
Nations Cup final
And then it was on to the last five-star team challenge of the year at the inaugural Longines League of Nations Final in Barcelona (ESP) in October, where the Germans flexed their not-inconsiderable muscle once more to take the brand-new title, while Ireland finished fourth.
Coyle and Legacy sparkled, producing one of just four double clears on the day. It’s a measure of this great mare’s quality that two of the other double-clears were posted by two of the greatest horses in the modern sport - the mighty stallion United Touch S ridden by Germany’s Richard Vogel and the Olympic double-bronze-winning gelding Beauville Z NOP ridden by Dutchman Maikel van der Vleuten.
The Irish tally of 20 left them on level-pegging with Sweden, but the slower time posted by the side that also included Denis Lynch and Vistogrand, Mikey Pender and HHS Calais, who were impressive winners of the Grand Prix two days earlier, and Cian O’Connor with Fancy de Kergane, saw them having to settle for fourth behind the Swedes, while the Dutch filled runner-up spot behind the new German champions.
Irish supporters still had plenty to celebrate, Ariel Grange’s Legacy taking the Best Horse title for her performances in this first LLN season, while Coyle took a cut of the €200,000 bonus on offer for double clear rounds, before joining van der Vleuten and longtime world number one Sweden’s Henrik von Eckermann to share the Best Athlete Award. All three riders produced five clear rounds during the LLN series.
Michael Pender and HHS Calais won the €300,000 five-star Longines Grand Prix at the League Of Nations final in Barcelona / Tomas Holcbecher
Big wins
Other big five-star wins during the year included Pender’s World Cup victory with HHS Calais in Sharjah (UAE) in February and the Grand Prix win for Darragh Kenny and Amsterdam 27 in Wellington, USA the same month.
One of the most emotional victories of the year was that of Michael Duffy and Clapton Mouche at the Longines Global Champions Tour in Miami in April. It was the Galwayman’s first ever five-star Grand Prix success and, when he tearfully dedicated it to Patricia and David Dodd, parents of his best friend Jack Dodd, who so tragically died in a car accident in 2018 at the age of 25, there was hardly a dry eye in the house.
Conor Swail steered Count Me In to Grand Prix victory in Spruce Meadows (CAN) in June, and in September, Sweetnam and James Kann Cruz won the American Gold Cup and Richard Howley topped the Grand Prix in Coapexpan (MEX) partnering Zodiak du Buisson Z.
Michael Duffy and Claptonn Mouche on their way to winning the five-star Longines Global Champions Tour Grand Prix at Miami Beach in Florida \ Stefano Grasso/ LGCT
Swail and Casturano were winners in Tryon (USA) in October and in November Kenny and Cartello won in Monterrey (MEX), while Michael Duffy finished third in the Super Grand Prix with Quirex at the Global Champions Tour Playoffs in Riyadh (KSA), a remarkable come-back to top sport after a long absence for the horse and confirmation that Duffy is growing inexorably into another Irish star to be reckoned with on the world stage.
And finally Cian O’Connor rounded out the year by being named “Mr Nations Cup 2024” by the Swiss magazine PferdeWoche for producing a spectacular 15 clear rounds from four horses during the year, including 11 from Fancy de Kergane.
As is the way of the world, not everything went according to plan. But once again Irish show jumping was in great shape in 2024, while 2025 looks filled with promise.