Jonty Evans (born 4 October 1971) is an Irish

eventing Eventing (also known as three day eventing or horse trials) is an equestrian event where a single horse and rider combine and compete against other competitors across the three disciplines of dressage, cross-country, and show jumping. Thi ...

rider.

Personal life

Evans grew up near

Trefriw Trefriw () is a village and community in Conwy County Borough, Wales. It lies on the river Crafnant in North Wales, a few miles south of the site of the Roman fort of Canovium, sited at Caerhun. At the last three censuses the population of the ...

, in the

Conwy valley , name_etymology = , image = Boats in River Conwy.jpg , image_size = 300 , image_caption = Boats in the river estuary at Conwy , map = , map_size = , map_caption = , push ...

North Wales , area_land_km2 = 6,172 , postal_code_type = Postcode , postal_code = LL, CH, SY , image_map1 = Wales North Wales locator map.svg , map_caption1 = Six principal areas of Wales common ...

. He is married with two children and lived near Cheltenham in the Cotswolds, where he had a yard. He now lives near Broadway in Worcestershire.

Eventing career

Evans has been competing internationally in eventing for more than twenty years. Although brought up in Wales, Evans represents Ireland, thanks to his grandfather having been born in Northern Ireland, allowing him to hold an Irish passport. Evans competed at the 2005 European Eventing Championships where he was placed 7th in team eventing and 40th in individual eventing competition. In 2015, he helped lead the Irish team to the nation's first-ever Irish FEI Eventing Nations' Cup victory in the Boekelo Nations' Cup. Evans was selected to compete at the

2016 Summer Olympics The 2016 Summer Olympics ( pt, Jogos Olímpicos de Verão de 2016), officially the Games of the XXXI Olympiad ( pt, Jogos da XXXI Olimpíada) and also known as Rio 2016, was an international multi-sport event held from 5 to 21 August 20 ...

Rio de Janeiro Rio de Janeiro ( , , ; literally 'River of January'), or simply Rio, is the capital of the state of the same name, Brazil's third-most populous state, and the second-most populous city in Brazil, after São Paulo. Listed by the GaWC as a b ...

with his

Irish Sport Horse The Irish Sport Horse, or Irish Hunter, is an Irish breed of warmblood sporting horse, used mostly for dressage, eventing and show-jumping. It was bred from 1923 by cross-breeding of Irish Draught and Thoroughbred stock. There was some limited ...

Cooley Rorkes Drift. This was Evans first time to make the Olympic team. The Irish team finished eighth in the three-day eventing competition, but Evans qualified for the individual eventing final. He finished ninth in the individual eventing competition. In 2017 the owner of Cooley Rorkes Drift (Art) decided to sell him - which meant Jonty would have lost the horse. So Jonty set up a crowdfunding initiative to buy him. It was a massive success and on 9 August 2017, Jonty bought Cooley Rorkes Drift with the help of £500,000 raised by crowdfunding. On 3 June 2018, during the cross-country portion of the Tattersalls event in Ireland, Evans suffered a serious brain injury from a fall.

Controversies

On 31 December 2020 the

Low Pay Commission The Low Pay Commission (LPC) is an independent body in the United Kingdom, established in 1997, that advises the government on the National Minimum Wage. It is an advisory non-departmental public body of the Department for Business, Energy and In ...

of the

Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy The Department for Business, Energy and Industrial Strategy (BEIS) is a department of His Majesty's Government. The department was formed during a machinery of government change on 14 July 2016, following Theresa May's appointment as Prime ...

revealed that "Mr Jonathan Evans, trading as Jonty Evans Equestrian Activities, Gloucester, failed to pay £5,008.16 to 5 workers"

References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Evans, Jonty Living people 1971 births Irish male equestrians Equestrians at the 2016 Summer Olympics Olympic equestrians for Ireland