EQUESTRIAN: Clear cross-country rounds from three of Ireland's eventing quintet yesterday were enough to boost the team up from ninth to seventh in the overnight rankings, but the medals have now slipped well out of reach.
France hold the overnight lead, but have only two fences in hand over Germany going into this afternoon's show-jumping decider, with the British a further fence adrift in third.
Susan Shortt got yesterday's cross-country action off to a foot-perfect start with a sensational clear. First through the finish flags when Austrian pathfinder Andreas Zehrer was eliminated after a fall at the second water, Shortt and Just Beauty Queen made Albino Garbari's course look easy, but 15 seconds over the optimum time meant the addition of six time faults.
"I don't really know where I lost the time," Shortt said after setting the standard for the rest of the field. "I went out not having a clue about how fast it would ride and I was 10 seconds down at the four-minute marker. If I'd gone out later I would've been quicker over the first half of the course."
Hopes of a move on the medals were dealt a severe blow when next out, Sasha Harrison, had a run-out at the first water complex.
Harrison was at a loss to explain why the 16-year-old All Love du Fenaud had ducked out at the second of the boat corners, but the result was an accumulation of 41.6 penalties.
Next out Niall Griffin and Lorgaine scorched round the 34-fence track, getting home in fractionally under 10 minutes to miss the optimum time by less than 12 seconds.
The Wexford jockey admitted afterwards he had been swamped by nerves before his round, but he looked the epitome of calm confidence as he sailed round the course for just 4.8 on the clock.
However, Irish fortunes took a further nosedive when Edmond Gibney and Kings Highway parted company eight from home. The pair had coasted round until Grainne Ward's gelding tore off the shoe on his near fore.
Obviously sore, Kings Highway tried to put in another stride before tackling the big log on top of a sloping mound and breasted the rail. The 12-year-old somehow managed to save himself, but lost his jockey.
Gibney was rapidly reunited with his horse and went on to complete, but the damage was done and the resulting 80.6 penalties left him way off the pace in 65th at the close of play.
Under immense pressure to revive team fortunes, last man out Mark Kyle did the job with surgical precision, riding the round of his life for a magical clear inside the time with Drunken Disorderly.
"The course really suited him, but that's what he was brought here for," an ecstatic Kyle said after his tour of the track boosted him to overnight 28th and best of the Irish, just ahead of Griffin in 30th and Shortt in 32nd.
Frenchman Nicolas Touzaint held onto his dressage lead with a picture-perfect round with his European gold medal ride Galan de Sauvagere, but Pippa Funnell's 11.2 time penalties with the headstrong Primmore's Pride dropped the British rider from overnight second to seventh, leaving a gap that was rapidly filled by Germany's Bettina Hoy and the Irish export Ringwood Cockatoo.
