Another individual Olympic bronze for Maikel van der Vleuten and Beauville Z!

Three years after their individual bronze medal at the Tokyo 2021 Olympics, Dutch rider Maikel van der Vleuten and his top horse Beauville Z made history again yesterday! In the beautiful gardens of the Château de Versailles, van der Vleuten and Beauville Z experienced a déjà vu moment, because after a particularly sensational final, they now also secured individual bronze at the Paris 2024 Olympics!

The Château de Versailles has been the setting for the Olympic equestrian disciplines for the past 10 days, where the individual final of the show jumping was on the programme yesterday morning at 10.00am. The 30 best combinations from yesterday's individual qualification appeared at the start of this absolute denouement, for which Spanish arena builder Santiago Varela and his French colleague Gregory Bodo had once again put together a dazzling display. It was a long and tough course consisting of 15 obstacles with no fewer than 19 jumps, and in particular the second element of La Rue Française-double jump at obstacle 5-was to be a major showstopper. Out of the 30 combinations that made their appearance in the ring, only three eventually managed to get through the basic round unscathed, thereby securing a spot for the all-decisive jump-off.

So one of the 3 combinations who were allowed to compete for the distribution of the medals was Maikel van der Vleuten and his Beauville Z, the 14-year-old son of Bustique and Jumpy des Fontaines who was bred in the Netherlands by Pascal and Monique Habets and whom he already managed to jump an impressive record in the past few years. Van der Vleuten and Beauville Z were the second combination to start in that decisive jump-off and were keen to surpass their performance of 3 years ago in Tokyo. They started their jump-off strongly, but unfortunately suffered a jumping fault when jumping the double jump at fence 10, making it bronze again for the successful duo.

Maikel van der Vleuten: "I still have to realise it a bit. It's incredible. This is paramount. When you are so close, you hope for a different colour. I had seen Christian Kukuk, the first starter, on the screen. I wanted to make a canter jump less between obstacle 1 and 2. That didn't work out. Then I thought, I have to take the risk. With a forward distance I rode into the double, but Beauville just missed the height. That's sour. You shouldn't underestimate that Beauville already had five rounds in his legs. I was able to ride well to the finish. I'm incredibly proud of this medal."

"I have won bronze three times in a row. That is for a huge confirmation and reward. If you can do that three years in a row it's a fantastic feeling," Maikel referred to the bronze in Tokyo and two years ago at the World Championships in Herning, where he was also part of success coach Jos Lansink's silver team. In addition, Beauville Z is the third horse in history to win two individual Olympic medals.

While people could enjoy the individual final yesterday, the team competition took place a few days earlier. At the grand final on Friday afternoon, the best 10 countries from the qualification competed against each other and here, too, a medal went to one of the Zangersheide horses. Indeed, the team gold went to Great Britain and there young Harry Charles was part of the team with his 15-year-old gelding Romeo 88, a son of Contact van de Heffinck and Orlando born to the Ruant family of Picobello Horses as Champion Of Picobello Z. While his teammates Ben Maher (Dallas Vegas Batilly) and Scott Brash (Jefferson) both had to deal with 1 penalty point for time, Charles and Romeo 88 did manage to keep the 0 on the scoreboard and thus had an important part in the gold medal for the British team!

Harry Charles: "Winning the Olympic gold medal is every athlete's dream and I think it was very special to do it the way we did it. We were the only team to have three rounds without jumping faults. The Tokyo Olympics 3 years ago was a big learning curve for me and without it I definitely wouldn't have been able to deliver what we did here. I think you have seen a difference in how much the partnership has grown over the past three and a half years. It matters so much how well you know your horse and I will be forever grateful to him!"

A third Zangersheide horse to show strong performances over the past few days was the 14-year-old mare Legacy, the daughter of Chippendale Z and Bon Ami bred by Romain Rotty and named Chavantele Z at birth. Under the saddle of Irish rider Daniel Coyle, Legacy might not have won a medal, but the pair managed to impress again with some fantastic rounds. During both the qualification and the team final as well as the individual qualification, Coyle and Legacy put in a flawless performance, making these Paris Olympics successful for them as well!