The World Equestrian Federation makes surprising judgments in the battle for Olympic starting places. A rider living in Germany is also affected. In addition, two teams may not start in Tokyo after positive doping tests.
Berlin (dpa) - Just five months before the Olympic Games, the world equestrian association FEI uncovered a scandal and admitted its own mistakes.
Several tournaments have been manipulated in the struggle for starting places for the games in Tokyo, but the results have now been deleted by the FEI. "It's a good sign that it came out," said Soenke Lauterbach of the German Press Agency. The general secretary of the German Equestrian Federation FN commented on the mockery that was blown up: "It didn't have much to do with fair play and the Olympic concept."
The FN President sees it similarly. "I don't want to reproach certain riders, but someone wanted to cheat," commented Breido Graf zu Rantzau: "Nobody does that out of whim. It's good that the FEI also saw their mistakes."
After protests from various associations and riders, the FEI had examined tournaments in France and Syria in the past few weeks. There was a trick to get points for the Olympic qualification.
"The investigation of the three tournaments in Villeneuve-Loubet in December 2019 showed that, contrary to the FEI regulations, two tests were added after the entry deadline, which counted for the Olympic ranking and the world ranking," said the FEI. And she admitted: "The updated timing of the three tournaments ... was accidentally recognized by the FEI."
The trick was that only informed riders registered for the relevant exams. These competitions were deliberately organized for "a small group so that certain riders can collect points," said the FN general secretary. For example, in one of these exams, only five pairs competed.
The same trick was used in three other tournaments in Villeneuve-Loubet in January 2020. The results obtained there have now been "removed" according to the FEI, the riders lose their points gained there.
Mathilda Karlsson, who lives in Grönwohld in Schleswig-Holstein, is affected. The 35-year-old Swede, who has been racing for Sri Lanka for three years, started in Villeneuve-Loubet, and the stud farm Grönwohldhof reported the successful Olympic qualification on the website on February 18. After the recalculation of the points, two of the 13 individual starting places for Tokyo have now gone to Taiwan and Hong Kong - not to Thailand and Sri Lanka.
The FEI also found irregularities at three tournaments in the fall of 2019 in Damascus, where people ride in the country despite the civil war. However, according to the World Association, these rule violations have no effect on the Olympic starting places. Syria and Jordan can send riders to Tokyo.
However, three positive doping tests have an impact. Canada and Qatar lost their Olympic starting places because team members were caught banned from qualifying tournaments. Morocco and Argentina are the successors.
FEI announcement
Olympic qualifiers
Grönwohldhof
