Irish success, British disappointment as Madrid team win €6.4 million GCL Final

The Global Champions League, which runs in parallel with the Longines Global Champions Tour, is a team show jumping series which brings together top athletes (of both the human and equine variety) from different nations. Nineteen teams started the 2018 season, with most of the stars of the sport – including Olympic, World and Continental champions – on the various squads.  

For the first time this year, the top 16 teams in the League advanced to a playoffs in the Czech capital, the GCL Super Cup Final. And after a weekend of competition, it all came down to Sunday’s Final, where six teams of three riders each faced off on a course designed by Uliano Vezzani, featuring 1.60-metre high obstacles. €10 million in prize money was up for grabs in the GC Playoffs alone. 

Equestrian sports, which involve two athletes – the horse and the rider – are by nature unpredictable, and in the GC Final two of the favourites for the title were unexpectedly eliminated, including Ben Maher’s London Knights squad. The British rider and his team had won both the 2018 Longines Global Champions Tour and Global Champions League regular season titles, but in Prague his nine-year-old mount Explosion W twice refused to jump at a wall. A similar situation for World No.1 Harrie Smolders’ Montreal Diamonds, after Jos Verlooy’s mount Igor pulled up at the final fence.

With the path to the top of the podium open, it was the experienced trio of Dutchmen Marc Houtzager and Maikel van der Vleuten and Spaniard Eduardo Álvarez Aznar – whose Madrid team had finished 10th in the regular season – which rode its way through to victory, topping the final standings and pocketing €2.743 million. Valkenswaard United, with Allen, Marcus Ehning and Alberto Zorzi, finished second while the Paris Panthers (Yuri Mansur, Gregory Wathelet and Kenny) took third. 

Team entry fees in the GCL are a reported €2 million, and Madrid in Motion is backed financially by Marta Ortega, daughter of the fifth richest person in the world, Spanish billionaire Amancio Ortega, who owns the parent company of clothing brands like Zara, 

Jennifer Gates, Paris Panthers Team Owner and President of Evergate Stables, said: “This was an incredible three days of show jumping. I couldn’t be more proud of the riders representing the team this weekend – they were incredible and gave it their all through the last round, as they have done all year. I’m so grateful to the GCL for putting on this incredible event…. I can’t wait for the 2019 season!”

For his part, GCL Co-Founder Jan Tops confirmed that the global show jumping circuit will expand to 20 events next year and said of the inaugural Prague playoffs: “We’ve had a picture perfect event; it’s something two years ago we couldn’t have dreamed of. Everyone has contributed to this success – from the team owners, to the riders, the grooms, all our staff, our partners from every leg and especially here in Prague, with the family Kellnerova. Our sport is in a new era.”