Willy Arts Showing “Improvements” After Serious Accident–Condition “Fair”
12 years ago StraightArrow Comments Off on Willy Arts Showing “Improvements” After Serious Accident–Condition “Fair”
Willy Arts was “making improvements” Thursday after suffering serious injuries in a carriage accident during Friesian Stallion Testing at DG Bar Ranch in Hanford, California. The hospital listed his condition as “fair.”
“Willy is making improvements and the doctors are pleased with his progress,” DG Bar posted on their Facebook site a day after he was airlifted to the hospital with severe head injuries.
“He is talking with us and can move his arms and legs. He is so tough, which we all knew, but it is very encouraging to see! I let him know that everyone was thinking of him and he said, ‘Thank you!’
“We still do not have precise details on his injuries but he is very stable.”
Willy, aged 53, is popular throughout the United States and Europe as a breeder and trainer of young Dutch horses.
He came to the United States from Holland in 1984 to train horses for Tony and Betty DeGroote. Their DG Bar Ranch was opened in Hanford a year later.
Over the years he has developed many young horses including his home bred and trained mare Valeska DG (Krack C x Farrington) that he competed at the World Championship for Young Dressage Horses in Verden Germany in 2008.
He is has been a guest judge at the Pavo Cup Finals in Holland and annually attends the KWPN Stallion Licensing in ‘s-Hertogenbosch, The Netherlands. In 2010 he won the U.S. Young Horse Championships on the four-year old Brendo DG.
He is chairman of KWPN-North America, a branch of the Dutch-horse association.
