From death's door to Olympic gold: How British equestrian Laura Collett triumphed against the odds
Ahead of the fifth competition of seven of the FEI CCI5* 2023 eventing season, Olympics.com takes a look at the astonishing story of the Tokyo 2020 Olympic champion.
“You set goals and sometimes it takes longer to achieve than you first wanted.”
So said equestrian Laura Collett, who is set to compete at the latest stop on the 2023 five-star tour, the Luhmuhlen Horse Trials in Germany from Thursday 15 – Sunday 18 June.
The blip in the Briton’s quest for eventing honours was a riding accident at the Tweseldown Horse Trials in July 2013, which almost cost Collett her life.
The then 23-year-old had to be resuscitated five times and suffered a fractured shoulder, two broken ribs, a punctured lung, a lacerated liver, and damage to her kidneys.
Placed in an induced coma for six days, recovery from the injuries progressed, but the loss of sight in her right eye would prove a more challenging long-term issue. “Depth perception was a bit strange,” Collett told the sport’s world governing body, the FEI.
Things could have been worse if Collett had not opted to wear the inflatable jacket that blows up on impact to protect the rider.
Collett felt people thought her elite career was over, which just added to her drive to succeed, getting back on the horse just two weeks after leaving hospital in a tentative return to riding. Tentative, that is, for her family and friends – with no memory of the fall herself, Collett was just happy to be back doing what she loved best.
READ: How to qualify for Equestrian eventing at Paris 2024. The Olympics qualification system explained
Laura Collett’s first dream realised
Seven years later, Collett achieved her first childhood dream – winning her first five-star level title – at the 2020 Pau Horse Trials in France.
At the start of the event, Collett’s expectations were tempered due to it being her horse's first attempt at the highest level of annual eventing competition.
The Brit knew that if London 52 did everything right he could be up there, but just thought, “let’s just have a nice round and see what he can do”.
The pair smashed the dressage discipline, and during the cross-country leg, Collett felt her horse turn from “a boy to a man. It felt like he was saying, yes, we can do this”.
A clear round was needed in the show jumping discipline, and the pair cleared the barriers to claim the win.
Collett dropped to her horse’s neck, hugging him tight, before dismounting and celebrating with her team.
“I’m totally speechless,” Collett wrote on her website. “I’ve dreamed of this day ever since I first watched eventing on TV as a kid and decided it was what I wanted to do …. but as much as I dreamed it, I never believed it would actually happen. Today is proof that dreams really can come true.”
READ: What we learned: Equestrian wrap-up from the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games
Olympic dream realised
Yet, the success at Pau doesn’t even make it into the two-line bio on Collett’s website due to what came next.
A year later, at the delayed Tokyo 2020, Collett was part of the trio that won Great Britain’s first Olympic gold medal in team eventing since 1972, alongside Oliver Townend and Tom McEwen.
Come 2022, Collett and London 52 claimed the iconic Badminton Horse Trials title, leading from start to finish and setting an all-time Badminton record finishing score of 21.4.
Collett was subsequently voted 2022 Professional Rider of the Year by Horse and Hound magazine, which should help in her quest for a place in the GB eventing team for Paris 2024, should she and London 52 keep up their form and steer clear of injuries.
Courtesy of a fourth-place finish at the 2022 FEI Eventing World Championships in Pratoni del Vivaro in Italy, Great Britain have qualified the maximum three quota spots available per National Olympic Committee.
The places will be hotly contested, but if there's one thing we know about Collett; her dreams are big.
With a team title to defend, and an improvement on her ninth-place in the individual event to put right, few would bet against her.
FEI CCI5* eventing competitions 2023
20 – 23 April 2023 Adelaide Equestrian Festival, South Australia, Australia
27 – 30 April 2023 Kentucky Three Day Event, Lexington, USA
4 – 7 May 2023 Badminton Horse Trials, Gloucestershire, UK
15 – 18 June 2023 Luhmühlen CCI5-L, Germany
31 August – 3 September 2023 Burghley Horse Trials, Stamford, UK
19 - 22 October 2023 Maryland Five Star at Fair Hill, MD, USA
26 - 29 October 2023 Les Etoiles de Pau, France