North Vancouver native Tiffany Foster is nearly a lock to make the Canadian team in equestrian for the Rio Olympics, making 2016 her second appearance at the Games.
But when Foster goes to Rio this summer she’ll be treating it like it’s her first Olympics, like London 2012 never happened.
“I’m going to kind of erase it, I’m going to pretend that it’s my debut,” Foster told the North Shore News last week, on the phone from her home-away-from-home in Belgium. “(London) was just a warm up.”
There’s a good reason Foster would want to block out 2012. Four years ago she was a relatively inexperienced rider taking part in her first big international horse jumping event. She rode one round in qualifying and was set to take her second pass when her Olympic jumping dreams came crashing to the ground. A veterinarian found a “hypersensitivity” in the left front leg of Foster’s horse Victor – essentially a small sore spot, according to the Canadian team – and Foster was disqualified from the competition just moments before the second qualifying round was to begin.
Protests were lodged, riders threatened to boycott, but in the end the ruling stood and Foster ended up in a teary-eyed press conference that broke the hearts of Canadians following the Games back home.
“At the time it was quite devastating,” said Foster. “It’s something that you’ve worked towards and put a lot of emphasis on. A lot of time and effort goes into getting there in the first place.”
The hypersensitivity rule is in place to stop competitors from intentionally irritating a horse’s legs to get them to jump higher. Disqualifications, however, are subjective and can be enforced regardless of whether the marks on the horse were caused by humans or by the horse’s misstep. The Canadian team contended that Victor could have easily suffered his small scratch by bumping his leg in his stable.
“It’s one thing when you get caught doing something wrong,” said Foster. “But if you’re not doing anything wrong and then you have to be punished for it, it’s hard to understand. It’s hard to get your head around.”
Foster now likes to think of the silver lining of her misfortune.
“The rule was in place to prevent people from doing something bad, so if me being punished for something I didn’t do is actually going to stop someone from doing what that rule is in place for, then maybe in the end it’s worth it. … I’d rather have every horse out there be properly cared for.”
That huge mess over a small scratch is what Foster is hoping to block out when she goes to Rio, although she said she has truly moved on as she has continued to improve and post impressive results on the world stage.
“It was a long time ago now and I’m kind of at a different place altogether. I think I’ll be all right,” the 31-year-old said with a laugh. “It’s like anything that’s bad that happened to you, any type of pain. At the time it seems horrible, and in the end it’s something bad that happened and you don’t really remember how bad it was.”
And the Games weren’t all pain.
“I spent the night in the athlete’s village, I walked in the opening ceremonies, I met a bunch of other Canadian athletes and everybody was there for the same reason,” she said. “There was a real sort of magical feeling about the whole thing that I’ve never experienced before and I’m hoping to experience again if I go to Rio.”
In the four years since London Foster has competed on a few different horses, with Tripple X III emerging as her likely partner for the Rio Olympics.
“He’s awesome. He’s got tons of experience, he’s a very powerful, very scopey horse who can jump really, really big passes. Kind of anything you can throw at him, there’s nothing he can’t jump. It’s a good feeling to have him there.”
The Canadians will be looking to build on some strong recent results, including gold in the team competition at last year’s Pan Am Games in Toronto. Canadian legend Ian Millar and Olympic gold medalist Eric Lamaze are the team leaders heading to Rio.
“We’re going with a lot of experienced horses and riders, and I think as a nation for Canada we’re going to go and absolutely try our best, and there’s no reason why we can’t walk away with a medal again,” said Foster. “I know myself personally, I feel a lot more prepared and experienced than I did – I really went to the last Olympics as a bit of a rookie on an inexperienced horse. I’m really grateful that I got to go but I definitely feel a lot more prepared going to this one. I’ve been competing on the global stage for the last four years now, since those last Olympics.”
Before Rio, however, Foster will have a rare opportunity to compete in a major event close to home. The Furusiyya FEI Nations Cup event scheduled for June 3 at Langley’s Thunderbird Show Park is actually incredibly close to home for Foster – she grew up in North Van but moved to Thunderbird Show Park in her teens, living and working there for seven years as she honed her horse skills.
“All of my junior riding, the majority of it was spent at that exact show park. It’s going to be very exciting,” she said. “For me it’s a huge thrill. It’s always fun to compete there at any point, but for me Nation’s Cup is one of the most fun events that you can do as a show jumping rider, so to do it here in your hometown is really cool. I hope we have a great day.”
This will be the first Olympic-calibre International Equestrian Federation team jumping competition to ever take place in British Columbia. Lamaze and Foster, who will be back on Victor for the event while Tripple X III stays in Europe, will headline the Canadian team competing against athletes from the United States, Mexico, Ireland and Belgium. Foster will have a huge hometown cheering section of family and friends at the event and she’s hoping others will come and check out the action. Admission is free.
“The more people the better – we all really thrive on that,” said Foster. “If you have the opportunity to come out and watch, it’s definitely something that you’re not going to see every day in that neck of the woods. I would really encourage everybody to come out and support Team Canada. We would love to see as many people as we can out there. It’s going to be a great event because I know Thunderbird is going to put on a top-class competition. If anyone has a free day it’s definitely worth coming out to see.”
For more information on the event, visit the Thunderbird Show Park website at tbird.ca.
