It was at the eighth obstacle, which looks like someone has copied the Eiffel Tower, that things started to go wrong. Then came the ninth, a symbol of the railway stations in Paris.
Henrik von Eckermann and King Edward lost their balance and wanted to go in different directions. The team captain explains how he perceived the situation.
I think he has a fine calm, jumps the combination, the line down, then something happens which makes him put in an extra jump and loses his balance a bit already towards the Eiffel Tower, says Henrik Ankarcrona.
Then he knows it's a long way ahead and then he has to put on full speed to reach the next obstacle, and then he's out of balance.
Got stuck in mascots
In a pair of Olympic Games mascots showing the start and finish, the team gets stuck. If they hadn't been there, the pair might have made it and been able to continue. A sigh went through the fully packed stands in Versailles.
They're both out of balance and it results in one going right and one going left.
Ankarcrona – himself a merited rider – says that he hasn't experienced anything like this during his time as team captain. He has led Sweden to medals, among other things, in the European Championship 2017, the World Championship 2018, and in the Olympic Games in Tokyo most recently.
"Everything falls apart"
He says that you see riders falling off at jumps over obstacles, but not like this. The first thought was about von Eckermann's safety.
I thought, hope he doesn't hurt himself, says Ankarcrona.
First and foremost, whole and healthy, that's the most important thing, but it's clear that everything falls apart when you fall off.
It's a relatively composed team captain who meets the press in the interview zone a few minutes after the fall.
You know how incredibly much energy and time lies behind this, but we work with living animals. We have to be constantly awake. Incredibly much nerves, energy. Everything has to be close to the maximum for us to get it. And today it ran over.
Swedish equestrian sports had representation in all three disciplines – eventing, dressage, and show jumping – but leaves Versailles without medals.
The closest to a medal was the eventing team, a questionable judgment from bronze.
Both dressage and show jumping failed miserably.
Last time equestrian sports left the Olympic Games without a medal was in Sydney 24 years ago.
