Eventing star Shane Rose says he’ll wear a gold mankini if he wins at Olympics

Shane Rose has survived a mankini ‘scandal’ and being crushed by a horse in his push to make a fourth Olympic appearance. If he claims gold in Paris, he has a special celebration planned.

Shane Rose with Virgil at the Centennial Parklands Equestrian Centre in Sydney. Picture: Richard Dobson

Australia’s eventing rider Shane Rose has already won three Olympic medals in his career but if he can claim an elusive gold in Paris, he has a special celebration planned.

“If we (the eventing team) win a gold medal I think there will be a gold mankini,” Rose said, laughing.

It has been a wild ride the past six months for Rose to qualify for his fourth Olympics after he made international headlines for wearing a mankini at the Wallaby Hill Extravaganza in February. If the fallout from what he says was an anonymous and vindictive complaint over the incident was inconvenient then being crushed by a 550-kilogram horse was career threatening.

Rose, 51, broke bones in 19 places from the accident in March, but on Thursday he was all smiles – and cracking a few jokes – when he was officially announced as part of a nine member Australian equestrian squad heading to Paris.

Rose in his gold mankini in February. Picture: Facebook

“I feel as strong as I had ever been and really confident that I’m getting ready to do as good a job as I need to do,” said Rose, who was briefly stood down over his mankini ride until cleared by an investigation.

Rose already has two silver medals and one bronze from Games appearances in Beijing 2008, Rio 2016 and Tokyo 2020.

“I’m a competitive person by nature and I want to be the best in the world,” said Rose, who will ride 18-year-old Virgil in Paris. “We haven’t done that yet, that elusive gold medal is still out there and hopefully Paris is the one.”

Rose said he was 100 per cent fit and feeling positive after his serious accident.

During that training incident he broke multiple ribs, fractured his right elbow, broke his femur and smashed the front and back of his pelvis and sacrum.

“One of my first discussions with one of my surgeons was that he said it’ll take me 10 to 12 weeks before I am walking and I remember thinking ‘I might need a new doctor’ … but no the doctors have been really, really helpful,” he said. “They’ve all been aware of what I’ve been trying to achieve and they’ve just helped me, probably pushing the limits to some degrees about the best thing in all their knowledge is that I have not had a day that I’ve gone backwards. Every day has been better than the previous.”

He didn’t ride for eight weeks, the longest he had been off a horse. “The first time I sat on the horse the first moment was pretty painful, I was thinking; ‘oh this is not good’ but within a few minutes I felt comfortable,” Rose said.

He’s hit the gym hard, but it hasn’t been smooth riding and has since had two falls in his preparation.

“Falling off at 51 – you don’t bounce as well [as you used to],” Rose said. “But it happens and it is what it is.”

Overall Rose thinks his ability to recover from horror fall and subsequent recovery can be attributed to his “positive” mindset.

“I know I’m fairly resilient, I think that people call it resilience, I just think positive, like I’m always looking forward to what I can do better and what I can achieve not so much what has happened …[it’s about] learning from it and move on … and it’s new opportunity in Paris.”

“It’s going to be a great opportunity for us to hopefully beat the rest of the world.”

Another member of the squad is Edwina Tops-Alexander who will make her fifth Olympic appearance, the most by an Australian jumper.

For the first time, Australia will compete with an all-female jumping team with Tops-Alexander joined by debutantes Hilary Scott and Thaisa Erwin. Chris Burton and Kevin McNab will join Rose in the eventing team while Simone Pearce, Jayden Brown and William Matthew will compete in dressage.