Karen O'Connor and Mr. Medicott at Barbury, photo by Samantha Clark. Karen was also a member of the 1988 Seoul Olympic Team, along with Phyllis Dawson.
The EN inbox has been stuffed full with goodies from Young Riders, the Olympics, and the expected Insanity in the Middle. We recently received two emails linking to articles about the Olympics: one reminiscing about the Olympics of 1988, and one looking ahead to London this week (both of these teams including Karen (Lende) O’Connor). Many thanks to Phyllis Dawson and Heather Lende for writing and sharing with us. Two great stories, and well worth the read. If you have something you’d like to share, send it to [email protected].
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Phyllis Dawson is a well-known and well-respected upper level eventer based in Virginia, and was a member of the 1988 US Olympic Eventing Team in Seoul, Korea. The team that year consisted of Bruce Davidson with Dr. Peaches, Karen Lende (O’Connor) and The Optimist, Ann Sutton (Taylor) with Tarzan, Phyllis with Albany II, and Jane Sleeper as the alternate rider.
On her website TeamWindchase.com, Phyllis recalls her Olympic Memories:
Competing in the Olympics is the experience of a lifetime. I was lucky enough to get the opportunity to ride in the 24th Olympic Games, in Seoul, Korea, in 1988.
I bought Albany II, my Olympic mount, in England in 1985. I was looking for a young horse with International level potential, and Bruce Davidson helped me find him. I quickly came to appreciate Albany’s wonderful personality; he was an affectionate and trusting horse who always tried his best one hundred percent at everything he did. We formed a special bond. Of course, I had dreamed of representing the United States in international competition all my life – but until Albany came into my life I never really believed I would get there.
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My instructions from Michael Paige were to try for a steady clear round, and not take chances with the time. The only specific instructions that he gave me that differed from my own plan was to take the long route at the combination at number 17 rather than the direct corner option; only one rider had tried the corner so far, and had a run-out.
We were about ready to walk into the Start Box – and there was a ‘hold’ on course. This is never good for the nerves, but I reminded myself that we had been held at the start at the selection trials at Kentucky, and that had worked out OK. (I later learned that as I went to the Start Box I was being televised live on prime time TV – when the hold occurred they cut to commercial, and then picked me back up when I was about half way around the course.)
Before long, the hold was over and I rode toward the Start Box. Even though I felt nervous, it was a positive tension. After years of competing, I had learned how to turn my nerves into a competitive edge. There was a moment, just before the start of the cross-country, of wonderful anticipation. “This is it. It is what we have trained for all these years. We have earned our way here, and all the preparation has been done. We have negotiated the Roads and Tracks, galloped the Steeplechase, and gotten through the Vet Box with no major mishaps. Everything I have worked for, everything I hope and dream, comes down to this, what Albany and I do in the next thirteen minutes. It is all laid out there before us.”
As I walk into the Start Box, I think that this has to be the most important day of my life. It is time for the countdown – I punch my stopwatch – 3-2-1-GO! We are off and running.
We are on course and galloping down to the first fence, a straightforward slanted palisade. The second is a large hedge; I can feel the toe of my boot against the brush, actually forcing my boot outward. Albany has found his rhythm quickly, and is galloping and jumping well. Next is a ski-ramp type road barrier, big but inviting, then around a turn and straight down a steep hill to the Bamboo Drop, a very upright vertical, the first big question on the course. Albs stays balanced and nips over it tidily.
The galloping lanes are narrow and twisty, lined the whole way with the blossoming cosmos. I can hear spectators calling out “Go, Phyllis” and Go USA!”
Read the entire article here. It is long, but a very enjoyable read.
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Fast-forwarding back to 2012, Heather Lende will be attending the Olympics this year. Heather is an Alaskan writer traveling with her mother-in-law, Joanne Lende, to see her sister-in-law Karen O’Connor compete, and is blogging about it from a kind of “outsider but insider view” for the Huffington Post.
From the Huffington Post, written by Heather Lende:
On My Way to London to See the Olympics With Grandma Joanne
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I have never been to the Olympic Games before and I am a reluctant traveler. I have taken one long trip in my life, from the east coast where I was born and raised, to Haines, Alaska where I have lived for 29 years. The good news is that my London Olympic companion is a seasoned traveler. My mother-in-law Joanne Lende (Grandma Joanne) has seen her daughter, Karen O’Connor, compete at two other Olympics in Seoul and Atlanta. This will be Karen’s fifth, and at 54, she is the oldest U.S. Olympian. “Does this mean I’m the oldest Olympic mother?” Grandma Joanne, who is 80, said, and asked me to book her a hair appointment before we leave. Which isn’t really necessary, since she looks like she’s at the Kentucky Derby when she’s sitting on my Alaskan deck.
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Since Grandma Joanne was at our house at the time, and since she wanted to go to see her daughter compete, and since it is so far from Alaska to the England, and since I am the one person in our family who is a little afraid of airplanes and travel, but am friends with my sister-in-law and would love in my heart to see her in what will probably be her last Olympics, even if my body is a tad anxious about it, I became Grandma Joanne’s traveling companion.
We quickly booked outrageously expensive bad seats from Alaska to Washington DC to London. We will be staying with Grandma Joanne’s friend Gill (pronounced Jill) in a seventeenth century thatched roofed cottage a short train ride from the action. The athletes each get two tickets to their event, and Joanne and I will have Karen’s. When Grandma Joanne asked Karen if we had tickets to the opening ceremonies, which she can’t wait to see, Karen asked her to look for two on e-Bay. Turns out the athletes only march in and out, but don’t get to attend the gala blast off.
“We’ll get in. It won’t be a problem,” the Olympic viewing veteran Grandma Joanne said. “In Atlanta where was plenty of room once we got there because the seats were so hot you couldn’t sit on them.” London is wet, so if we pack rain gear we’ll be fine.
Click here to read the entire article. We look forward to hearing more from Heather as her trip continues!
