Equestrianism: Financial loss causes Windsor Trials' demise

Mike Tucker, who resigned as chairman of British Eventing as a result of the Windsor fiasco, gave an impassioned speech during yesterday's Open Forum which preceded British Eventing's AGM at Stoneleigh. He admitted to two serious errors of judgement. The first was in accepting the role as chairman of Windsor at the request of Jonathan Warr, who had succeeded him as the event's director after Tucker became the short-lived chairman of British Eventing.

"I was only there in a supervisory role, I was never part of the management team," Tucker said. His second "major mistake" was in failing to divulge the contents of an e-mail that Warr had sent him on 15 April in which it was said that the predicted loss, estimated at £2,000 in November 2004, was now £49,969. Warr had said that he would be grateful if this were to "stay between us at this stage."

British Eventing, owners of the fixture, became aware of the e-mail only after the event - too late to take any cost-cutting action.