After the death of one of his prize horses the week before, Tim Collins could have done without more bad luck during the crucial Pan American Eventing Championships.

And at the beginning of the competition, where he was hoping to gain key qualifying points towards next year's Olympics, the Bermudian looked to be heading in the right direction.

In second place in the individual standings after the dressage event at the Fair Hill International Festival in Maryland, USA, Collins was riding high.

However, his good fortune was not to last, his horse, Delton Magna, going lame part way through the cross country section on Saturday. That forced Collins to retire from the championships and saw him slip to 21st in the standings, denting his hopes of making the trip to Athens next year.

Yesterday, he was heading back to his base in the UK, but Mike Collins, his father and chef d'equipe for the event, said it had been a deeply disappointing few days.

"Last Wednesday one of his other horses (Captain Darling), who we took to Boekelo (Holland) and had a problem on the steeplechase, broke his pelvis and died after coming back to England. He suffered the injury in Holland and was found dead in his box on Wednesday morning. Although we thought it was muscular, the autopsy diagnosed it as a broken pelvis, so we haven't had the best of luck recently with horses . . . one has died on us and this one went lame," he said.

Collins senior said the incident at Fair Hill meant his son would have to change his schedule somewhat in order to find events that would offer potential qualifying points.

"He had a brilliant dressage but if horses go lame they go lame," he said. "It's one of those things and that's horses for you.

"We are going to have to try and get points somewhere else now but they don't have the power of that particular tournament. That was a three star with four star points."

As for the condition of Delton Magan, Collins said it remained to be seen how long the animal would take to recover.

"We don't know how the horse is at the moment," he said. "When I left it it was still having painkillers. We won't know for another two or three days (what the prognosis is)."