BY JEAN LLEWELLN (PRESS RELEASE)
PHOTOGRAPHY: LAFRENTZ
Germany’s multi-Olympian international dressage rider, Isabell Werth, will compete at the FEI-WBFSH World Breeding Championship for Young Horses in Verden for the very first time, (her third time at the WBCYH) and will be bringing her ‘Lion’ with her!
If everything goes to plan, she will compete in five World Championship classes within 11 days: Isabell Werth is a member of the World Championship team in Aachen and will also be in the saddle shortly before that at the FEI WBFSH Dressage World Breeding Championships for Young Horses in Verden. This is made possible by the manageable distance between Warendorf and Verden – around 200 kilometres.
The Aachen World Championships team will be holding a training camp in Warendorf in early August, where Werth and Wendy de Fontaine intend to fine-tune the last details for their World Championships performance. At the same time, Werth can prepare the six-year-old V-Power for his World Championships appearance in Verden, travel from Warendorf to Verden, and present V-Power in the Horse24 Arena.
This is only the third time in her career that the eight-time Olympic champion has presented a horse at the FEI- WBFSH Dressage World Breeding Championships for Young Horses. The first time was in 2000, when she rode the then six-year-old Westphalian Richard Kimble (Ribbeck), into the World Championships arena in Arnhem. In 2023, she presented the seven-year-old Valdiviani in Ermelo and finished fifth in the final.
With V-Power, the son of her great hope for the future, Viva Gold, Werth is therefore competing at the FEI WBFSH Dressage World Breeding Championships for Young Horses in Verden for the first time – and she’s delighted! “I have a long-standing connection to Verden,” emphasises Werth. “I used to go to Verden three or four times a year with the Doctor (Dr. Uwe Schulten-Baumer) to look at young horses. Verden was our main port of call. The Doctor always took me along; we attended the licensings, watched the auction horses during selection and in training, and the Doctor taught me everything. I found it absolutely fascinating.” Verden is simply one of the most important breeding and equestrian centres in the world...
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