British Riders Head to France to Defend European Eventing Championship Title

Team GBR’s Eventing squad head out to Fontainebleau in France today to defend their Team Gold title, which has been won by British riders over the last seven European Championships.

The Team includes 2008 Beijing Olympic Bronze Team medalists William Fox-Pitt and Tina Cook, plus 2009 Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials and Mitsubishi Motors Badminton winner Oliver Townend. They are joined by British Senior Team debutants Nicola Wilson, Lucy Wiegersma and Piggy French to complete the talented squad of six.

The six riders and their six horses will arrive at the host location, 40 kilometres from the French capital tomorrow (Tuesday 22nd September) to join Team GBR’s performance manager and trainers.

The event will run in the usual three day event format, where the horses undergo the first horse inspection on Wednesday, followed on Thursday and Friday with the dressage phase, cross country on Saturday, ending with show jumping on Sunday, pending the second horse inspection.

The trip to Fontainebleau has been possible thanks to the unerring support of the Equestrian World Class Programme, which supports a pathway to success for Eventing, Show Jumping, Dressage and Para-Equestrian Dressage athletes. The aim is to have in place a sustainable system that can deliver more medals on the international stage now and in the future. The Programme has been funded by the Department for Culture, Media and Sport, primarily from the National Lottery, via UK Sport since 1998.

Be sure to watch the BBC coverage of the Championships if you have BBC Interactive, at the following times;

Saturday September 26th:   10.00 – 1615 (BST) Red Button
Sunday September 27th:     09.00 – 11.00 (BST) Red Button

                                            13.00 – 15.00 (BST) Red Button

                                             15.00 – 17.00 (BST) BBC 2

Or for live updates follow the British Eventing News page on the website at www.britisheventing.com or the British Eventing Tweets on http://twitter.com/BEventing 

 The squad of six travelling to the Senior Eventing Europeans is:

Tina Cook riding Mr & Mrs Nicholas Embiricos and Sarah Pelham’s Miners Frolic
William Fox-Pitt riding Mr George & Mrs Jayne Apter’s Idalgo
Piggy French riding Miriam Midgley, James Midgley, Sue Crane and Walter French’s Some Day Soon
Oliver Townend riding Mr Edward & Mr Robert Nicholson’s Flint Curtis
Lucy Wiegersma riding Mrs Ginnie Lyne’s Woodfalls Inigo Jones 
Nicola Wilson riding Miss Rosemary Search’s Opposition Buzz