Tales from Tokyo: ‘Israel saved my grandmother – to ride for a country she loved so much means everything’

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Ashlee Bond and Donatello 141 at the Tokyo Olympics
Ashlee Bond and Dontello 141 at the Tokyo Olympics.
(Image credit: Peter Nixon)

Ashlee Bond is 36 and says she’s “been dreaming of the Olympics since I was 12”. But when she made her debut last night at the Tokyo Games, it was a particularly poignant moment for her as she rode under the Israeli flag.

“My father was born in Israel and my safta – my grandmother in Hebrew – was like a second Mom to me,” she says. “She immigrated to Israel in the 1940s with her husband and my dad and uncle.

Pippa Roome
Pippa Roome
Magazine editor and eventing editor

Pippa is a true eventing geek and has been H&H’s eventing editor since 2005. She has first-hand experience of competing up to British Eventing intermediate and international CCI2*-L level, and has worked in the industry on a top event yard. Pippa enjoys nothing more than immersing herself in the sport at the highest level, reporting from the five-stars and international championships, including the Olympics.