“If you can keep your head when all about you

Are losing theirs and blaming it on you,

If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,

But make allowance for their doubting too;

If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,

Or being lied about, don’t deal in lies,

Or being hated, don’t give way to hating,

And yet don’t look too good, nor talk too wise”

If, by Rudyard Kipling

NESTLED in the heart of horse heaven in Co Meath, in Cian O’Connor’s ‘man cave’, Ireland’s most capped show jumper laid down his targets for the two seasons ahead in the lead up to the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.

Cian’s cave is littered with beautiful carefully selected art pieces, while a life size sculpture of Blue Loyd, his Olympic medal-winning partner from the 2012 London Olympic Games, will soon join other specially commissioned pieces in the manicured lawn.

His favourite poem, If (by Rudyard Kipling), framed above his championship medals in his office, demonstrates O’Connor’s deep thinking and motivation.

The 39-year-old Kildare native is a self-confessed organisation expert, so it makes sense that January is the month he gets all his ducks in line.

The latest addition to his top string, with the deal signed this week, is PSG Final and the talented gelding cements “the best team of horses I have ever had in my life”.

But it hasn’t been all plain sailing since the World Equestrian Games last September, where O’Connor was pleased with 13th place individually, despite being disappointed for the team missing out on an Olympic qualifying place.

Good Luck came home from Tryon with a soft tissue injury and will miss the first part of the season. However that break will allow the stallion to engage in breeding duties for the first time, before being campaigned lightly towards the end of the year.

O’Connor purchased the talented mare Lady Cracotte in October, however a tragic accident on the cross ties at a show in Montpellier resulted in her untimely death.

“That was the toughest time I’ve had in a long time. For the first time in a very very long time I was shook.

"I felt my whole world had imploded,” he explained.

“Just in terms of trying to do the right thing, taking a punt, investing your own money. I did one show, I loved her. I refused a lot of money for her after the first show when I could have made a significant profit. She was a little mare, she reminded me a little bit of Blue Loyd… maybe I was romancing a little bit, thinking I could go to the Olympics on this horse and next thing she died. The poor horse, it was very upsetting.”

BOUNCING BACK

But in true Cian O’Connor fashion, after allowing himself a few days to process what happened, he got back to business. “I looked at my stock list and sold a few horses and I just put myself back on track. I felt ‘ok now we are back to zero let’s get stuck in and make the most of it’. I studied every horse in the world.

“And that is the thing, the best horses aren’t on the market. So you have to hustle and get stuck in and see the best way to get the deal done, and I find that as exciting as winning the Grand Prix. Ruth is always saying ‘will you ever give up on that guys, he’s not going to sell that horse’, but I always keep at it.”

That determination secured him one of the best mares in the world at present, Irenice Horta, from Stephex Stables. The now 11-year-old mare by former world champion Vigo D Arsouilles finished seventh at the 2018 WEG in Tryon and third in the five-star Grand Prix in Dublin with Lorenzo de Luca.

“She feels very nice, I have jumped her maybe four or five times since I got her and I will go down to Spain and get the hang of her in some small classes. There is only one target, which is Rotterdam [European Championships], so I want to go best there,” the team-driven rider said.

The Olympic Games are the number one motivator for O’Connor; he is willing to sacrifice everything else this season in order to help the team qualify. With Irenice Horta and PSG Final, he is aiming to get on four Nations Cups this season in La Baule, Sopot, Aachen and Dublin, with the aim of being selected for the European championship team.

With 120 caps for Ireland, he is not short on confidence. “I don’t want to be shooting myself in the foot, and raving what I am going to do, I have to do my talking in the ring really. I got stuck in and got them bought and now is the time to get going.

“Just because I buy a fancy horse, doesn’t mean I get on the team. I am the same as everyone else, I have to do the job.”

TEAM DEDICATION

However, he has his eye on a few more championship medals. “I’d be thinking, I’m not going to do this when I am 50. I am 39 now so if I got two more Olympic Games, I’d be happy. So you’re heading towards 45.

“I just would be so happy if the team could qualify, it’s been so long. Ireland didn’t qualify a team since Athens. My individual medal in London was great personally but if we could get the team there it would be great.”

O’Connor believes the support systems are in place to do that, and with Rodrigo Pessoa’s ‘A’ team identified, all roads lead to Rotterdam and beyond. “I am keen that we play together as a unit earlier in the season to get to know each other. The more we see each other, the better that will be. If we can practice together early, that will be a good dress rehearsal.

“You have to prepare everybody and be inclusive, and I think Rodrigo is good at that, he is communicating with everybody.

“I was talking to Bertram [Allen] recently and said ‘Imagine if someone told us now, you’re not going to win €1 until Rotterdam, but you are going to qualify for the Olympics’. And he said ‘yeah I’d take that’.

“Everyone is fed up of not qualifying so I think there is a great appetite amongst the lads, and sacrifice means sacrifice! If you have people coming [to Rotterdam] with sound, fresh horses, we will beat the rest.”

He is also battling to keep his own fitness in line. “My hassle is my lifestyle of travelling and flying and staying places means sometimes I struggle with my own fitness. I have to watch what I eat and try and be as fit as I can be.

“When I got injured in May 2017, I got stuck in and lost over a stone before Gothenburg and it helped me. And then sometimes I get a bit idle again and I have to refocus myself. That is something I am doing now at the minute.”

Cian O'Connor and Good Luck in Aachen. Photo Tomas Holcbecher

HOME

O’Connor juggles many hats. On his brief visit home this week, he pencilled in this interview, a day of coaching at Coolmore Showjumping with brothers Max and Tom Wachman, meetings, as well as spending quality time with his wife Ruth and two children, Ben and Cara.

There are huge developments happening at his 69-acre home in Co Meath, with the construction of an indoor, outdoor grass and sand, 20 stables and all the extras. Darragh Ryan has joined O’Connor’s team to produce the young horses in Ireland.

“Darragh will base here full-time, that will be his main role. Ross (Mulholland) and Michael (Kelly) also ride, but they coach too. We got to the stage where we need that now, we can’t afford to keep going out to buy the Grand Prix horse.

“If you can buy the best five-year-old and if you’re picking them correctly, they should develop into the best eight-year-old and either be a horse for me to ride or one to market.”

In partnership with Andrew Hughes, O’Connor has close to 70 animals at Ennisnag Stud in Co Kilkenny. “I buy a couple of foals every year, I bought five in 2018, and leave them there. We will probably use the base here now to take the best of them up [through the ranks].”

That brings O’Connor to the subject of show facilities in Ireland and the role he is keen to play in helping existing Irish show centres improve. “Clare Hughes contacted us recently about setting up a group, working with a couple of people’s advice.

“If we have expensive horses here, we want to go to places where they are not going to get injured. You see the likes of Opglabbeek and Peelbergen in Europe, if we could have one of them it would be great, and if over 10 years we could aim to have one in every province. Then you would have a place to develop your horse and bring in clients and that is going to create more exports.

“I’d love to help that happen because it’s going to be in my best interests – I don’t want to be based here and have nowhere to jump.”

For the first year in quite some time, O’Connor will bypass the Winter Equestrian Festival in Florida and remain in Europe for the winter, heading for the Spanish sunshine tour in Vejer de la Frontera instead with 28 horses and a host of clients.

Reflecting on the past and looking towards the future, O’Connor said: “It’s incredible the highs and lows that life throws at us. For sure it’s normal to say we get down when things don’t go well but staying down never won anything. Even on the darkest day it’s so important to think and believe that opportunity is just around the corner.”