Ireland - the land of the horse - will have no show jumpers at the Olympic Games in Sydney. Peter Charles, who was nominated as the sole individual to make the trip when the show jumping team was withdrawn in April, has pulled out and Jessica Kurten, the German-based Co Antrim rider named as reserve, has also withdrawn.

Both were part of the Irish team that won last month's Modena Nations Cup in Italy which started the impressive Irish hat-trick completed by back-to-back victories for the rookie team in Helsinki and Drammen that has now put Ireland at the head of the Samsung Nations Cup league table.

"If we hadn't gone so well in the top Nations Cups I wouldn't have considered pulling out," Charles said yesterday. "I've thought it over very carefully and I think it's the right decision. I feel we could win in Dublin and we could beat the British on home ground in Hickstead."

Charles has only one top horse, Traxdata Amber du Montois, and says that the mare would effectively be missing all team action from the end of July until the middle of October.

Ireland's Olympic horses all go into quarantine on August 7th and return from Sydney on October 10th, ruling out Dublin, the prestigious Canadian Nations Cup show at Calgary and the Samsung Nations Cup finals in mid-October.

Olympic Council of Ireland president Pat Hickey expressed his disappointment and proposed that funds be made available to compensate athletes for any financial losses incurred through their Olympic participation. "Minister McDaid should take the bull by the horns and go to his colleague in agriculture and come up with a package to compensate these equestrian athletes. We would love to see them in Sydney, especially with the results they've been getting recently."

But Peter Charles denied that there were any financial implications in his withdrawal. "Finances don't come into it," he said. "I don't need financial incentives to make me go to the Olympic Games and if money was offered to me I wouldn't take it. If there's money available give it to the younger riders."

Kurten is also keen to remain on the Nations Cup circuit, particularly while the Irish team is notching up such good results. "But the finances obviously come into it as well," she said yesterday. "The only people who are remembered are the medallists and I have to be realistic about my chances. I want to support the team at home and I want to go to Hickstead, Dublin and Calgary."