Laura Collett reflects on her Olympic eventing showjumping team round

Laura Collett and London 52 collected four penalties at fence four, an oxer over a water tray, in their first Olympic eventing showjumping round for the team medals today (2 August) at the Tokyo Games. Their new individual score of 29.8 meant that Britain maintained their team gold medal position, 17.9 penalties ahead of Australia in team silver, and, helped to contribute to team gold for Team GB. Laura now sits in fifth place ahead of the second individual round of showjumping.

Olympic eventing showjumping: Laura Collett reflects on her round

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Gemma is an experienced journalist, who was a member of H&H staff from 2014 to September 2025. She is passionate about all equestrian sports, including racing and point-to-pointing. She has enjoyed riding out for top trainers Nicky Henderson and Charlie Appleby and took part in a charity Flat race at Epsom in August 2018. Gemma’s has reported from numerous five-star events around Britain and Europe, as well as European championships.

‘Obviously I’m gutted, but it could have been a whole lot worse’: Laura Collett reflects on her Olympic eventing showjumping team round

Olympic eventing showjumping: Laura Collett reflects on her round

“He just spooked basically and ended up paddling through the poles, but he is a very good jumper to recover and come straight to the treble without it luckily it fazing him – he got it back together and finished jumping really nicely.”

“Obviously I’m gutted and it’s a shame but I think it could have been a whole lot worse in that situation, so I’m just relieved that we managed to scrape it back.

“I think I’d have been even more annoyed if it had been an unlucky rub of a pole – I was no doubt in that fence was coming down and luckily we didn’t come down as well.”

Laura said that she is still very proud of the 12-year-old London 52, who she owns with Karen Bartlett and Keith Scott.

“I’m really, really proud of him for doing that in that in that environment with the pressure and everything – it’s so annoying and frustrating but equally I have to look at the flip side that it could have been even worse,” she explained.

“It’s one of those things – he’s never jumped under lights before and it’s a huge occasion in there and he’s still pretty inexperienced so hopefully he’ll have learned from it and do better next time.”

You might also be interested in:

‘He felt incredible’: Tom McEwen goes clear in Olympic eventing team showjumping

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Tales from Tokyo: ‘I feel a responsibility to say, “Screw that – you can do it any way you want to”’

Olympic eventing showjumping: Laura Collett reflects on her round

“He just spooked basically and ended up paddling through the poles, but he is a very good jumper to recover and come straight to the treble without it luckily it fazing him – he got it back together and finished jumping really nicely.”

“Obviously I’m gutted and it’s a shame but I think it could have been a whole lot worse in that situation, so I’m just relieved that we managed to scrape it back.

“I think I’d have been even more annoyed if it had been an unlucky rub of a pole – I was no doubt in that fence was coming down and luckily we didn’t come down as well.”

Laura said that she is still very proud of the 12-year-old London 52, who she owns with Karen Bartlett and Keith Scott.

“I’m really, really proud of him for doing that in that in that environment with the pressure and everything – it’s so annoying and frustrating but equally I have to look at the flip side that it could have been even worse,” she explained.

“It’s one of those things – he’s never jumped under lights before and it’s a huge occasion in there and he’s still pretty inexperienced so hopefully he’ll have learned from it and do better next time.”

You might also be interested in:

‘He felt incredible’: Tom McEwen goes clear in Olympic eventing team showjumping

First glimpse of beautiful Tokyo Olympics showjumps as eventing team course revealed

Tales from Tokyo: ‘I feel a responsibility to say, “Screw that – you can do it any way you want to”’

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