FEI Meets CSI: Olympics Jumping Scandal Turned Over to Princess Diana Death Investigator

by Fran Jurga | 29 May 2009 | The Jurga Report

The popularity of horse sport in Germany is illustrated by the placement of this billboard in an inner city neighborhood. Flickr image courtesy of Fraencko.

The FEI, the world's governing body of equestrian sport, spoke today, after yesterday's shocking announcement that Germany was disbanding its national equestrian teams. Even as the European championships approach this summer and the World Equestrian Games (WEG) looms for 2010, a deepening scandal surrounding attitudes as well as actions by German riders, veterinarians and perhaps other officials in an attempt to deliver gold medals at Hong Kong during last summer's Olympics.

That's what was going on in Germany. Meanwhile, next door at the world headquarters of Fédération Equestre Internationale (FEI), in Switzerland, the case moved forwarded on legal and administrative legs that horse sports have never known before.

As some background: on Thursday, the FEI Headquarters filed a protest with the FEI Tribunal on the basis of widely reported admissions by German show jumper Marco Kutscher and veterinarian Björn Nolting concerning the undeclared treatment given to Marco Kutscher’s horse, Cornet Obolensky, at the 2008 Olympic Games and the circumstances surrounding this treatment including the collapse of the horse, which subsequently took part in competition.

If that is correct, after the horse collapsed from its medication, Kutscher still rode him in the Olympics. Compare that to the top British team horse, Portofino, that was scratched "to be safe" before the vet check because he seemed off but was fine on the competition day but, of course, not allowed to compete.

The FEI's protest requests the provisional suspension of these individuals from any FEI activities pending the results of its investigation. It also requests the provisional suspension of Hanfried Haring, FEI Bureau Member, judge and former Secretary General of the German NF, of his responsibilities on the FEI governing body, on the basis that he had knowledge of the relevant facts and did not report them to the relevant authorities.

The FEI had already appointed a three-member ethics panel to look into the German team doping scandal at the 2008 Olympics; the panel includes US Equestrian Federation President David O'Connor.

The panel is headed by London's former Metropolitan Police Commissioner Lord Stevens. If his name sounds familiar, he was oft quoted in the tabloids and on television as he was the head investigator of the death of Princess Diana. In 2006, Lord Stevens and his investigation/security firm, Quest, investigated player corruption in the Premier League of British football, among other things. Sports scandals seem to be one of his specialties.

Today's statement's key sentence may be: "The Panel has considered some preliminary information and is of the opinion that there may have been breaches of FEI rules by riders, team officials and National Federation representatives, and concludes that it should continue to carry out a detailed investigation in order to make specific recommendations to the FEI President on these matters."

The rather long and legalish statement of the FEI today states that the FEI is more or less removing itself from the scandal and Quest is taking over the investigation on behalf of the FEI. As you can imagine, the FEI wants to know who knew what, and when he or she knew it---not only on the German team and within the German federation, but within the FEI.

The statement reads: "In the interests of efficiency and speed, the Panel members considered that the gathering of further information and evidence should be carried out by expert professional investigators. Quest was chosen for this purpose. The Panel Chair is also the Chairman of Quest, and, therefore, the selection was made by the other members of the Panel, and without participation of the Chair."

In other words, ethics panel members O'Connor plus Ken Lalo, chairman of the FEI Tribunal, and John Roche, FEI Director of Jumping, have turned over the investigation to the chairman, but this was done without the involvement of the chair during that decision.

More intrigue filtered out of Germany today, including a clouding factor that the television contract for German showjumping is up for negotiation and that the embarrassment of Germans caught breaking doping rules at both the 2004 and 2008 Olympics is not attractive to sponsors, no matter how popular the sport may be with viewers.

UPS sponsors show jumping in Germany and I checked today: they still have suspended show jumper Ludger Beerbaum on their web site. In one German newspaper, he was interviewed as saying that this would all blow over and he'd be back on the team soon.

This all sounds straight from one of those high-brow British detective mysteries on PBS that I love so much. It's just too bad it's the real world and the credibility of our horse sports is at stake.

German Equestrian Team Suspended as Olympic Doping Scandal Escalates in International Spotlight

by Fran Jurga | 28 May 2009 | The Jurga Report

Die Goldenen Reiter, a huge gilded statue in the city of Dresden, Germany became a symbol of Germany's drive for Olympic gold medals in 2008; Flickr photo by Lanchutt

Before you read this post, take a minute and watch this wonderful short video:
http://www.die-goldenen-reiter.com/film.html
Make it full screen; turn up the volume. All the way. Hit play.

You see, less than a year ago, I was preparing to blog the Olympics, and the German team sent me a link, so I could watch a terrific music video they had made to pump up the national spirit to get behind the Germans' push to come home with gold medals in all three sports at the Olympics equestrian games in Hong Kong.

I loved the video and its quick edits. I loved the idea of the team members singing along. Loved seeing some of my favorite horses and riders. Really loved the action closeups of the hooves with all those big studs digging into the grass. The song is really catchy. It was a big hit in the 1980s in Germany and the rock star who sang it is an icon--sort of a Billy Joel, German-style.

I watched the little video again after I spent Thursday tracking down the news from Germany and I saw something else, entirely. What do you see?


The international horse sport community will be reeling on Friday as the world wonders what is going on in Germany. And maybe in their own backyards. I wonder, too.

Thursday afternoon, the national equestrian federation of Germany, FN Verlag (FN), announced the suspension of all riders who represented Germany at the 2008 Olympics in Hong Kong's equestrian events, where Germany won three gold medals. In effect, FN Verlag and the German national sport federation have dissolved, disbanded, and suspended its equestrian teams for FEI-level events. To use one of my favorite German words: "kaput!"

This story began back on May 11, when the FEI reported that German Olympic show jumper Marco Kutscher told German reporters that his horse had been illegally treated with arnica and lactanase during the Olympics at Hong Kong in August. Kutscher's confession and subsequent accusations initiated a cascade of events that will probably not end with Thursday's drastic action, which affects not just jumping but also dressage and eventing. Dressage superstar Isabell Werth even made a callous offhand remark that what she does to her horse is the concern of her and the owner and no one else, thank you very much.

What began as an investigation of a single rider and the team veterinarian is now affecting a dozen riders' careers and reputations.

My German is not the very best, but I think I know what the German press release is saying: each of the riders is going to be thoroughly investigated and must apply to be reinstated. Only after assurance that the rider will be a leader for a clean sport will that rider be allowed to represent Germany ever again. There is no indication of how long this process might take, nor how long the FEI's own investigation might take. There is a comment that time is not a concern.

All this with the World Equestrian Games coming up in just over a year. What more can the FEI do to police the barns and schooling rings? Are veterinarians the advocates of the horse and the rulebook or are they under too much pressure just as the riders are? And just where does that pressure originate?

Germany has been double-shocked by statements made by show jumping champion Ludger Beerbaum this weekend, including his assertion that he would do whatever it took to win and understood that he just was not supposed to get caught. The FN press release mentions Beerbaum--and only Beerbaum--by name.

The scandal reaches higher; FEI Bureau Member, judge and former Secretary General of FN Hanfried Haring has been associated with the scandal and may lose his position.

Be careful about what news sources you check on this story. HorseandHound.co.uk is usually tops for European news and you can follow their headlines via Twitter @horseandhound.

Come on, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, and Sixty Minutes. You love a good scandal: do you have a reporter who speaks German? Here's your chance. What can the FEI say in its own defense, that these things have been going on in spite of rules and inspections and tests?

Equestrian sports woke up with two black eyes this morning. The elephant in the room got loose.

To refresh your memory about the Olympics in Hong Kong and the Germans' ups and downs there, please read my Olympic blog: The World Rides in Hong Kong. I feel like I should start the blog up again and write "The Rest of the Story".