Equestrian at the 1980 Summer Olympics – Team dressage

The team dressage in equestrian at the 1980 Olympic Games in Moscow was held at Trade Unions' Equestrian Complex on 31 July.[1]

Individual dressage
at the Games of the XXII Olympiad
VenueDressage Facility Nymphenburg
Date31 July
Competitors12 (4 teams) from 4 nations
Medalists
Yuri Kovshov
Viktor Ugryumov
Vera Misevich
 Soviet Union
Petar Mandajiev
Svetoslav lvanov
Gheorghi Gadjev
 Bulgaria
Anghelache Donescu
Dumitru Veliku
Petre Rosca
 Romania

Background

Since their historic victory over Germany at the 1972 Olympic Games in Munich, the Soviet dressage riders struggled to regain a leading position and missed a team podium entirely at the 1976 Olympic Games in Montreal. When a boycott of the stronger nations became obvious, the almost 100% chance of recapturing Olympic gold appeared on the horizon for the host nation.[2]

However, to get a team medal, there needed to be more than just a Soviet team in Moscow. As the countries belonging to the political west-block boycotted the Games, the Soviet Union had to stimulate countries from the east-block to take part. Those countries had some international dressage riders, but few really at the Olympic, Grand Prix-level. In the end, Bulgaria, Romania and Poland travelled to Moscow to guarantee a team competition. All this logistic maneuvering to guarantee a nations' ranking led to the fact that Poland, for instance, only found out they were allowed to compete with a team two days before departure.

In Moscow in the end there was a team class, there were three team medals awarded, but to speak of Olympic level is hard when looking at the results these brave riders and horses got from the highly experienced chief judge Gustaf Nyblaeus and his four colleagues. The judges' panel was challenged in its own way with more horses not able to show certain movements than they would have cared for.

The Soviet Union won their coveted team gold in the impressive Bitza stadium about 50 km outside Moscow with more than 800 points ahead of Bulgaria and Romania more than 230 points behind the silver medalists.

Competition format

The team medals were awarded after the Grand-Prix portion of the individual competition. After the Grand-Prix portion of the individual event the three rides of each team were added up and the highest score was the winner, all three scores counted towards the final. Both the team and the individual competitions ran concurrently.[1]

Results

Rank Names Horses Grand Prix Total
 Soviet Union
Yuri Kovshov
Viktor Ugryumov
Vera Misevich

Igrok
Shkfval
Plot

1588
1597
1254
4383
 Bulgaria
Petar Mandajiev
Svetoslav lvanov
Gheorghi Gadjev

Stchibor
Aleko
Vnimatelen

1244
1190
1146
3580
 Romania
Anghelache Donescu
Dumitru Veliku
Petre Rosca

Dor
Decebal
Derbist

1255
1076
1015
3346
4 Poland
Jozef Zagor
Elżbieta Morciniec
Wanda Wąsowska

Helios
Sum
Damask

1061
954
930
2945

References

  1. Evans, Hilary; Gjerde, Arild; Heijmans, Jeroen; Mallon, Bill; et al. "Equestrianism at the 1980 Moscow Equestrian Games: Mixed Dressage, Team". Olympics at Sports-Reference.com. Sports Reference LLC. Archived from the original on 18 April 2020. Retrieved 30 April 2020.
  2. "An Affair to Remember: the 1980 Olympic Games". Eurodressage. 25 January 2015. Retrieved 2 May 2020.
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