3 Players who have represented India in Equestrian at the Olympics
Many equestrian disciplines, including showjumping, eventing, dressage, endurance, and tent pegging, have a large fan base in India. The most popular of the five sports- eventing is sponsored by the Equestrian Federation of India.
Teams that compete in it have represented the nation in most Asian Games, taking home bronze in 2002 and 2006. India's athletes competed in four Olympic Games: 1980 in Moscow, 1996 in Atlanta, 2000 in Sydney, and 2020 in Tokyo. The nation's horse sport is intended to be supported by the Equestrian Premier League.
Anush Agarwalla was the only rider from India competing in the 2024 Summer Olympics in Paris. He was competing in the individual dressage event. Agarwalla represented India in the Olympic dressage competition for the first time ever and although he could not make it to the medal round, it was a good start from him.
Indian riders have only ever participated in the Summer Games' eventing divisions so far. He obtained the Olympic quota in February. Now let’s take a look at players who have represented India in the Equestrian sport at the Olympics.
Jitendarjit Singh Ahluwalia and Team
India’s first-ever appearance in the sport came all the way back to the 1980 Moscow Summer Olympics. Equestrian Sport at the 1980 Summer Olympics was represented by six events. Due to the US-led boycott, only eleven nations competed in the equestrian events, and for the first time, India participated as well.
However, it did not fare well for the Indian Team. India participated in the three-day event where the Indian team was represented by Jitendarjit Singh Ahluwalia, Hussain Khan, Muhammad Khan and Darya Singh. India participated in the Team as well as Individual events but unluckily all Indian athletes were eliminated from both the events.
Imtiaz Anees
The Sydney International Equestrian Centre hosted the individual eventing competition of the 2000 Summer Olympics program. India saw Imtiaz Anees as the lone participant from the country who participated in the Individual eventing.
The event then had three parts - Dressage, Cross Country and Show Jumping. The penalty points from all three parts are summed up and the athletes with the lowest penalty points are declared winners.
Anees had 61 penalty points in Dressage, 165.6 in Cross Country and 10 in Show Jumping. With a total of 236.6 penalty points, he stood at 23rd position, which was also the last obtained position among all athletes participating in it.
Fouaad Mirza
The most recent Indian appearance at the Sport happened to be at the 2020 Tokyo Summer Olympics. 65 riders from 25 nations competed in the tournament, Fouaad Mirza from India was one of them.
The eventing competition features all 65 riders competing in three rounds (dressage, cross-country, and jumping) with the top 25 advancing to a second jumping round. Scores from the first three rounds are summed to determine finalists; scores from all four rounds are summed to give a final score for the finalists. India did a much better job than before, keeping in mind the increased competition, but finished eventually at the 23rd place again.