Wiegersma has back-up plan for Olympic dream

By arjones

LUCY WIEGERSMA is playing safe with her Olympic dream.

Last year, the eventer from Highampton suffered the agony of having to withdraw from the Great Britain team a month before the Beijing Games.

Her horse, Shaabrak, had a foot infection that restricted training time and the national selectors were concerned he would not be in peak condition.

So Wiegersma will take no chances as she aims to represent her country at the London 2012 Games and hopes to have "three, four or five" horses in Olympic condition.

"London 2012 is very much at the front of my mind," said Wiegersma, 32. "Everything I'm doing at the moment is looking toward that.

"Last year I had one horse and he went lame just before the Olympics.

"I thought then that in four years' time I would have to be sitting there with three, four or five horses on form and ready for selection.

"Hopefully I'm on target, but horses have quite a high propensity for injury.

"You want them to do well in the here and now but at the same time you have got to do the best for them with a view to 2012 — it's a fine juggling act."

Wiegersma hopes to be called up for national service again next October for the World Equestrian Games in the United States.

This week, however, she has been looking back at the past 12 months after winning the equestrian award at the BBC South West Sports Awards on Sunday night.

"I was quite shocked," she said. "I knew I'd been nominated but I didn't think I was going to win anything.

"I hadn't prepared anything to say and felt a bit of a fool standing up there.

"But it was wonderful to be recognised alongside other great sportsmen — it was a fantastic feeling."

Wiegersma beat fellow eventer Mary King and Paralympic dressage rider Simon Laurens to the award.

"When I was a child, Mary King was someone I really looked up to — and I still do — so to beat her was great," added Wiegersma.

"There were some really very fine achievements recognised and to be up there among them was fantastic."

Wiegersma is a rising star of British eventing. This year she made her debut for the senior national team, finishing 13th in the European Championships, and won the Blenheim Palace International Horse Trials on Granntevka Prince, one of the Olympic hopefuls she is training in Highampton.

"My first senior team appearance went all right, it wasn't an amazing result for me but that was definitely something I have been striving towards for a long time," said Wiegersma.

"Having been selected last year for the Olympics and missed out, it was nice to get that tick in the box.

"Competitively, winning Blenheim Palace in September with one of the young prospects I have been bringing on for four or five years was the real high spot."

Those prospects returned to training on Tuesday with fitness work and indoor competitions ahead of them. The new season will start with a trip to Portugal in February.

Meanwhile, Shaabrak is working his way back from another injury that saw him miss the second half of last season.

"Hopefully he will be out fighting fit again and we will aim him for Badminton," said Wiegersma.

"He is coming to the end of his competition career and I would just like to enjoy him and make the most of the time he has left in competition."

Wiegersma was not the only North Devon sportswoman to be recognised in the ceremony at the University of Plymouth on Sunday.

Sixteen-year-old windsurfer Izzy Hamilton, from Whitstone, near Holsworthy, was nominated for the watersports award, won by Exeter swimmer Liam Tancock.

Triathlete Peggy Crome, aged 66 from Eggesford, was a nominee in the athletics category after winning two gold medals at the ITU World Championships in Australia. Cornish 800m runner Jemma Simpson took the prize.

Plymouth diver Tom Daley was named sports personality and young sports personality of the year.