British rider sustains injury

British rider Rodney Powell has undergone an operation for a broken ankle after falling from his horse on Friday and is out of the Sydney Olympics.

Powell, selected to compete in the individual three-day event, suffered the injury after his mount Flintstone reared up on a training run at Sydney's Horsley Park early on Friday.

He was operated on at Liverpool Hospital and will fly home next week. He will be replaced in the squad by Kristina Gifford on The Gangster, who had travelled to Sydney as a reserve.

Powell's injury has left the equestrian squad in sombre mood. "The whole team is disappointed for Rodney and wish him a speedy recovery," said British team official Simon Clegg.

"This is a terrible thing to happen to him so close to the Games."

It is particularly hard on Powell who, after winning Badminton in 1991, spent most of the rest of the decade in the doldrums. He then broke his hip in a fall at Gatcombe Park in 1999 leading to a year of intensive physiotherapy.

During that year he saw two of his best horses die.

"Some riders are lucky, and some aren't, and I seem to be among those who aren't," he said at the time.

Eventing has always carried a high risk but safety aspects came very much to the fore when five British riders were killed during 1999.

The deaths included Peta Beckett, Robert Slade, Peter McLean, Polly Phillipps and Simon Long, who was a close friend of Powell.

"I'd like to think that Simon was doing what he loved best when he died," Powell said at the time. "He knew the risks but how many more bad days can the sport take? Do we say it's an accident or do we go into the safety aspect of the sport?"

The British team will hope to present the sport in a more positive light with their first Olympic equestrian medal since 1988.

It is traditionally one of the country's strongest sports, producing 45 medals since the Games began in 1896, and hopes are high for success this year following an upturn in performances over the past two years.

Lottery funding has allowed a squad described by Clegg as the "best-prepared ever to leave Britain" to travel to Sydney at a cost of 500,000 pounds ($725,000).