He was forced to switch his menu to a vegetarian option but course designer Ian Stark was still satisfied that he had served up a feast which suited the most re-blooded of competitors following the cross country section of the Longines FEI European Eventing Championships at Blair Castle.

The four time Olympic medal winner joked that he had known there was no chance, in these parts, of a seventh successive September day without rain and so it proved, the heavens opening to create an additional, course-wide water hazard to those he had already set up for the world’s finest eventers contesting the biggest equestrian competition ever held in Scotland.

The relentless rain’s effect on underhoof conditions consequently forced Stark into an unusual mid-competition change to the most eccentric of his Caledonian-themed obstacles with the removal of the meatiest element of his “Haggis, ‘Neeps and Tatties” fence.

An eye witness to three successive falls at what was the middle element of a tricky downhill combination of fences Stark made the decision to remove the feature, but admitted he had done so with a heavy heart.

“It was painful to have to remove it. I was dragging my heels but you can’t have that,” he said.

“We tried to repair the ground, put a lot of stone down and were trying to fix it and we watched two more go through and although they jumped it much better we felt it couldn’t stand up to 30 more horses, so I made the call and radioed the Grand Jury and they immediately agreed, so we took it out.”

Such changes are not unheard of in eventing with the rules accommodating such changes and the timing was not as bad as it might have been since all of the international teams' first two riders had gone through the fence by that stage, while all of their third and fourth riders had still to take it on, meaning that any unfairness was minimal in competitive terms.

Furthermore, for all his disappointment at having to bring in a JCB to haul out the odd looking beast and leave it lying forlornly on the hillside, Stark felt the fence served its secondary purpose, since a haggis, neeps and tatties stall had been placed alongside it.

“I was sad to see it dragged out of the ground, pulled away and dumped on its side, but at least a lot of people who have never tasted haggis before have had it now, so we’ve done a good job. Some said they would hold me personally responsible if they got ill, but I think they quite enjoyed it,” he said jovially.

Stark’s relief was evident at having negotiated a difficult day, at the end of which the cream of world eventing had taken charge with Olympic champion Michael Jung in the overall lead and world champion Sandra Auffarth, his fellow German.

“I was sharing a B&B room with my wife, daughter and two grandsons and I’ve been awake since two o’oclock in the morning, trying not waken everybody, so I was twitching in bed for a couple of hours and then I got up and paced around and I couldn’t put the telly on I couldn’t read a book, but I did manage to get another half hour’s sleep before I came to the course,” he admitted.

“I think it has shown us off well and hundreds and hundreds of people who have walked the course have come to me and said they loved the courser and the Scottish themes and the riders respected the track and I think they had a nice time, so hopefully a lot of them will come here next year for our ordinary three-day-event.”

He was also delighted with the performance of the lone Scot in the field Wills Oakden, who had worked for Stark as a youngster and considers him a mentor.

“I am proud of him. He’s a lovely chap from a great family and he’s got endless talent,” he said.

“It’s his first senior team and it was a lot of responsibility and I know his horse doesn’t particularly like the muddy going, so that was even tougher for him, but he rode like an experienced mature rider and I’m thrilled for him.”

The performances of Jung and Auffarth have helped put Germany in a dominant position in the team event going into the decisive show-jumping element of the competition with Britain in second place after a day which saw only Izzy Taylor and Gemma Tattersall match Jung in completing a fault free round within the allotted time.