Badminton Horse Trials: Laura Collett sets record score to win event for first time

Image source, Getty Images

Olympic gold medallist Laura Collett set the lowest score in the 73-year history of the Badminton Horse Trials as she won the event for a first time.

Collett won the 拢100,000 top prize on horse London 52 with a final score of just 21.4 penalties.

The 32-year-old was 4.6 penalties ahead of British world champion Ros Canter on Lordships Graffalo.

"I am in a dreamworld," said Collett. "My goodness, that horse. He just jumped higher and higher out there."

She added: "He is just exceptional, and he has truly shown the world everything that I always believed in him."

London 52 was also the horse she won gold on in team eventing at last year's rescheduled Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

Oliver Townend, Collett's fellow GB gold medallist, came third making it a first all-British Badminton podium since 2002.

The staging was the first Badminton since 2019 because of the coronavirus pandemic and Collett said: "We have missed it and we've missed the crowds. It is great to be back.

"This horse owes me nothing. He has given me my first five-star win [at Pau in France two years ago] and an Olympic gold medal, and yesterday was the biggest, most intense cross-country course he has ever seen."