New agreement to help avoid doping scandals

ON WHAT was described as “a seminal day” by the chairman of Horse Sport Ireland, Joe Walsh, officers of both the HSI and Olympic Council of Ireland signed an agreement designed to ensure there is no repeat of the doping embarrassments heaped on equestrianism and Irish sport in general at the last two Olympics.

Cian O’Connor won an individual gold medal in show-jumping at the 2004 Games in Athens but his horse Waterford Crystal subsequently failed a drugs test, and O’Connor was stripped of his medal.

Two years ago, Denis Lynch’s highly fancied Lantinus was withdrawn from competing on the morning of the individual show-jumping final at Beijing when it was found to have traces of a prohibited substance.