‘I thought my Olympics were done’: British rider’s remarkable race back to fitness with fractured arm

Great Britain’s Harry Charles considers himself extremely fortunate to have made it to Paris 2024 as part of the Olympic showjumping squad, having fractured his arm in two places just four weeks ahead of the Games.

The 25-year-old was competing at CHIO Aachen in Germany at the start of July when he fell at the combination on nine-year-old stallion Bandit in a five-star jump-off class, injuring his arm as it took the full force of the landing.

“I knew straight away what I’d done and I thought that was me done for the Olympics,” said Harry, who was found to have two fractures in his arm – one in the radius (lower arm) and one at the top of his wrist.

“Even for the first week afterwards I was in a cast right up to my shoulder, so I really thought my Olympic chances were gone. But luckily I have some very positive people around me.”

Taped and braced – how Harry made it back to the ring ahead of Paris 2024

After a tough couple of weeks, Harry returned to the ring at Hickstead’s Agria Royal International Horse Show last week (25-28 July) with his arm in a brace (pictured above).

He jumped his Olympic partner Romeo 88 in lower-level classes in a back ring and partnered 14-year-old gelding Casquo Blue for the five-star classes, coming home with just two down in Sunday’s Agria King George V Gold Cup won by Donald Whitaker and Millfield Colette.

“My arm felt perfect, really good,” said Harry after his performance in the International Arena.

“We’ve a very good physiotherapist who has helped me and taught me how to tape it up before I ride and I just use a brace over the top when I actually get on a horse. So you still have all the movement you want, it just stabilises it.

“The first two weeks of healing were pretty slow in terms of progress, whereas the last week it’s gone really quick, so hopefully with one more really good week, it will still need taping in Paris, but I’m hoping I might not need the brace.

“Romeo was meant to do a smaller show the week before at Chard as his final jump before Paris and obviously we couldn’t do that so I thought I might as well take him to Hickstead instead and just pop him round once or twice to see how he’s feeling and let him just chill out and have fun. He feels really good. So I’m really excited now.”

Harry Charles: “Bandit was fine, which is the main thing”

Harry, who made his Olympic debut at Tokyo in 2021, has watched the video of his fall at the treble combination fence in Aachen but is still unsure what caused it.

“I jumped into the triple pretty well and just got caught up in it,” he said. “He was very good to stay on his feet – it could have been a lot worse if he didn’t. I’ve watched the video a few times to see if I could have done anything better, if I could have landed better, but it’s just natural and instinctive to stretch your arm out when you fall. But the horse was fine, which is the main thing, so I was very relieved about that. He’s back jumping small fences at home and is absolutely fine.”

Soaring into the top 10 in the world rankings

Harry has reigned for several years as the world’s leading under-25 rider and last month the Hampshire rider could celebrate moving into the top 10 in the senior rankings for the first time, reaching number nine in the Longines world rankings.

“For the past two years I’ve been hovering around it – I made number 11 four times,” said Harry. “So I’m really happy to achieve that. It was also totally unexpected because I didn’t do as much this month but I think it was the double clear in Rotterdam [Longines League Of Nations] that did it.

“So it’s really nice for my horses and my whole team – it’s a reflection on everyone.”

The Olympic showjumping in Paris begins on Friday, 1 August with the team qualifying competition, in which Harry lines up with his own and Ann Thompson’s Romeo 88 alongside team-mates Ben Maher (Dallas Vegas Batilly) and Scott Brash with Jefferson.

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