August 4, 2024 
Youth may be wasted on the young, but it’s not going unnoticed by chefs d’équipes around the globe.
“We’re seeing many more U25 and younger riders named to the teams this Games,” said Jayne Huddleston, a long-time photographer and journalist who began covering show jumping nearly 40 years ago and came out of retirement to do research for Olympic Broadcast Services this year.
“In the past, U25 riders would be a rarity as strong selections for the Olympics,” she explained, citing Canada’s Mario Deslauriers and Brazil’s Rodrigo Pessoa, both of whom attended their first Olympics at age 19.
(Fun fact: both riders are competing in Paris some 40 years and 32 years, respectively, after their first Olympics.)
The difference in 2024, according to Huddleston, is that in some cases, these under-30-somethings are taking the place of more experienced riders, some of whom have even been team mainstays in years past.
Case in point: Gilles Thomas, 26. The 2024 Belgian Champion made his Olympic debut in Paris with the undeniably talented yet relatively-untested 10-year-old breeding stallion, Ermitage Kalone.
Thomas is competing alongside Olympic veterans Jérôme Guery and Quel Homme de Hus, and Wilm Vermeir and his longtime partner IQ van het Steentje.
Interestingly, Thomas was selected for the team over both traveling reserve Grégory Wathelet (with Bond Jamesbond de Hay) and first reserve Pieter Devos (with Casual DV Z)—two riders with prior Olympic experience.
Both were part of the bronze medal-winning Belgian squad alongside Guery at the Tokyo 2020 Games. More than that, their stats speak for themselves: Wathelet and Bond Jamesbond de Hay jump clear at 54% at 26 rounds at 1.60m. Meanwhile, Devos and the 9-year-old mare Casual boast are clear at 60% in 15 rounds at 1.60m.
Thomas and Ermitage, by comparison, have never won a grand prix together, competing only four rounds to date at the championship-level 1.60m height (Jumpr). You wouldn’t know it in Paris, though. They went on to produce Belgium’s only clear in the team events.
Belgium isn’t alone in their methodology, either.
In addition to Olympic individual champion Ben Maher and team gold medalist, Scott Brash, the U.K. also nominated two, top-ranked FEI U25 riders: Harry Charles (25) and Joseph Stockdale (24).
In a nation that loves its show jumping dynasties, both Charles and Stockdale descend from U.K. horse sport royalty. Peter Charles earned team gold alongside Maher and Brash at the 2012 London Games, while Tim Stockdale competed in Beijing in 2008.
Joseph, sitting at no. 185 in the Longines Rankings, previously represented Great Britain—alongside Brash, Maher, and Charles—in the 2022 FEI World Championships in Herning, Denmark, but has never won a CSI5* Grand Prix higher than 1.45m. By contrast, 33-year-old rider Matthew Sampson (ranked at no. 41 in the world) was not initially shortlisted for the British team, but currently has four, CSI 5* 1.60m victories on the books in only the last two years.
Paris is the second Olympic appearance for Harry Charles and Romeo 88, having finished 7th with the British team in Tokyo in 2020. In the City of Lights, they delivered a clutch clear in the Team Final to pave way way to team gold for the Brits—three Olympic cycles after his father did it and with two of the same team members and a broken wrist.
Last up, Mexico selected an especially young team this year—the average age of three members originally slated to compete is only 28!
Tokyo 2020 Olympian Eugenio Garza Perez (28) was the most experienced rider named to the team and saddled his Pan Ams mount, Contago.
He was joined by 24-year-old Carlos Hank Guerreiro, who is currently ranked at no. 8 in the FEI U25. He came to Paris aboard the 10-year-old Zangersheide mare, H5 Porthos Maestro, and currently sits at no. 134 in the Longines Rankings and among the top 5 FEI-ranked riders in his country.
Finally, there’s 31-year-old Andrés Azcárraga and Contendros 2, who recently jumped 0/0 to help Mexico to a podium finish in the Mercedes-Benz Nations’ Cup at CHIO Aachen. In Paris, Azcárraga’s was replaced by traveling reserves Federico Fernandez (a four-time Olympian) and Romeo in the team event after his horse didn’t pass the first inspection. But he’s back in rotation for the individual qualifier.
Compare that to Nicolas Pizarro, who, at no. 48, is currently the highest-seated Mexican rider in the Longines Rankings. Pizarro also has Olympic experience, having finished ninth with the Mexican team aboard Crossing Jordan in London in 2012, though was not named to the squad this year.
Whether a natural changing of the guard or a deliberate move to bring fresh talent into the Olympic fold sooner, one thing is for certain. It’s a young gun summer in Paris.
