New London venue for Global Champions Tour

The new venue has been announced for the London leg of the Longines Global Champions Tour (24-26 July).

Go West

This year’s GCT event will be held in Syon Park near Kew Gardens, west London. A stately home, Syon Park is the London home of the Duke of Northumberland. It is surrounded bybeautiful parkland and gardens designed by Capability Brown, andwas used for filming in the2001 filmGosford Park.

“We are looking forward to being in London for the third year and delighted to be staging our 2015 event during our 10th anniversary year at the beautiful location of Syon Park,” said Longines Global Champions Tour President Jan Tops.

All change

This is the third home for the London showjumping competition. It was first held in 2013 at the Olympic Park at Stratford in West London, a venue that lacked the glamour and appeal of some of the other legs of the series.

Last summer it moved to Horse Guards Parade in central London, a location that was more in keeping with the other international events. However, the venue was not among those listed when the 2015 dates were announced on the GCT website.

Syon Park is set to provide some stunningly pretty backdrops – though Syon House isn’t central, like Horse Guards Parade. One of the best aspects of city centre locations is the exposure our sport gets to the non-equestrian public.

Top riders

With huge prize money of around £600,000 on offer, the London leg of the Global Champions Tour will no doubt attract many of the sport’s biggest names.

British riders have dominated so far at their home leg of the GCT, with Ben Maher winning the Grand Prix in 2013 after a thrilling jump-off with Nick Skelton, while 2014 series overall champion Scott Brash won last summer’s renewal.

The showpiece Grand Prix will take place on the afternoon of Saturday 25 July.

Watch the Longines Global Champions Tour series on Horse & Country TV at thefollowing times.