Tokyo Olympics: Hong Kong rider Thomas Heffernan Ho qualifies again after stressful and ‘mentally challenging year’

Hong Kong rider Thomas Heffernan Ho is hoping to put a stressful nine months behind him after successfully qualifying for the Tokyo Olympics for the second time on the same horse.

Ho had initially achieved his Olympic goal with his long-time eventing horse Tayberry for the 2020 Games, only for the Covid-19 pandemic to delay the Olympics by a year. Ho was asked to qualify all over again and his 12th place at the Sopot CC14*-S show in Poland in September ensured a place for Hong Kong in the Tokyo eventing competition.

Hong Kong’s only four-star rider is also hoping to qualify a second horse – Shannondale Vintage – and is halfway there after achieving Olympic qualification in the short format at Sopot. He hopes to compete in a long-format competition next year to confirm Shannondale Vintage’s place in Tokyo and give him a choice of horses before the Games.

“During that time in the UK, it was a bit high risk and we weren’t sure what was going on,” said Ho. “Travelling to Europe was very difficult and Poland was not exactly right next door but it wasn’t on the UK’s list of high-risk countries.

“I hired a transport company to drive the two horses to Poland and it took them two days to get there. I took a direct flight to Poland and met them there and I was lucky that there was no two weeks of quarantine at the time.