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Louise Thomas

Editor

Carl Hester, Charlotte Fry and Becky Moody have won bronze for Great Britain in the dressage team Grand Prix Special.

The British team qualified in third place behind Germany and Denmark, but took an early lead after Moody scored 76.489 per cent aboard Jagerbomb.

Hester was next up on Fame, slightly bettering Moody’s mark with 76.520 per cent, with Charlotte Fry was last to ride for Team GB with Glamourdale.

While she secured a score of 79.483 per cent, it was only good enough for third behind Germany and Denmark.

The bronze medal comes after a testing period for the British equestrian team, with three-times dressage gold-medal winner Charlotte Dujardin having withdrawn from the Games just days before the opening ceremony, meaning reserve rider Moody stepped into the team.

Dujardin dropped out of Paris and was provisionally suspended by equestrian’s governing body, the International Federation for Equestrian Sports (FEI), pending an investigation into a video from four years ago which showed her repeatedly hitting a student’s horse with a whip from the ground during a coaching session.

Hester, who enjoyed a long relationship with Dujardin as her mentor, said: “It’s been really difficult, very hard, and as I said before, we’ve had to put it out of our minds. I’ve had to concentrate on the team and I’m lucky in a way that I had Becky to deal with every day and help, which helps me focus on something else.

“We have full-time jobs most of us, then you come here and you have one horse to ride and you’re just going out of your mind with what not to think about all day and what to do all day.

“It’s been a long week but I feel fantastic now it’s done.

While Hester was appearing at his seventh Olympics, Moody was enjoying a dream debut with her gelding Jagerbomb, who she bred herself.

She said: “What an incredible stadium and the crowd were fantastic and my horse was a total legend.

“I think because I bred him and we’ve done everything together, he’s just a total dude – a lovely, lovely horse.

“He’s been quite spicy here this week and Carl has helped me out an awful lot to find that inner calm in both of us, but it has been fantastic and he’s been amazing.”

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