Kimberly Van Kampen, Prominent Wellington Equestrian Figure, Selling Hampton Green Farm, Moving to Ocala
5 years ago StraightArrow Comments Off on Kimberly Van Kampen, Prominent Wellington Equestrian Figure, Selling Hampton Green Farm, Moving to Ocala
By KENNETH J. BRADDICK
WELLINGTON, Florida, Oct. 28, 2019–Kimberly Van Kampen, a major figure in Wellington’s equestrian community, is selling her Hampton Green Farm within hacking distance of the Global Dressage Festival grounds she helped create and has moved to Ocala, 250 miles/400km away.
The move after 20 years in Wellington was confirmed to dressage-news.com weeks after the end of longtime professional ties with José Daniel Martín Dockx who competed Hampton Green Farm’s P.R.E. stallion Grandioso for Spain at both the 2012 and 2016 Olympics as well as the 2014 World Equestrian Games and the 2013 and 2015 European Championships.
Hampton Green had as many as 10 horses in training with Dani, including some bred at Hampton Green’s P.R.E. breeding farm in Fruitport, Michigan that Kim is keeping in operation.
In the past two decades, Kim has had a major impact on equestrian sports–an outsize effect on dressage–after moving to Wellington.
She is a member of the Wellington Equestrian Partnership, the consotium that owns both the Winter Equestrian Festival of jumpers and hunters and the Global Dressage Festival, both staged over three months at the Palm Beach International Equestrian Center.
Kim donated the covered arena large enough to accommodate four full-size dressage arenas to the Global complex. The arena hosts jumper and hunter shows during Wellington’s hot and humid summer.
She has hosted at Hampton Green Farm the annual Winter Intensive Training program, a winter-long development of riders under 21 years old and their horses operated by U.S. Olympian Lendon Gray, the creator of the nationwide Dressage4Kids project. Kim said that even when Hampton Green of 10 acres/4ha with 50 stalls in two buildings is sold she will continue to support the program at another facility.
Her U.S. P.R.E. Week in Wellington of seminars and meetings of breeders and owners from across the United States as well as from Spain has been a highlight of the winter circuit. The week will continue but in 2020 the traditional party that attracted hundreds of guests will be replaced by Friday Night Fiesta and will partially sponsor the Freestyle under the lights.
Hampton Green was originally built as a facility for polo but now is devoted primarily to dressage and jumping.
Kerrigan Gluch and Sophia Schultz, two under-25 riders will remain in Wellington for training and competition supported by Kim on her horses, including those that have been brought back from Spain.
Kim, with her two young daughters, and Michael Crook, whom she marries next weekend, have bought a 50-acre/20ha farm in Ocala, a city that bills itself as “The Horse Capital of the World.” The area was based originally on Thoroughbred breeding and training but has for many years had a large winter jumping circuit and has a growing dressage community.
A new facility named the World Equestrian Center and owned by an Ohio family is nearing completion in Ocala on 3,000 acres/1,214ha with climate-controlled stabling for 1,500 horses, a main stadium surrounded by a luxury hotel, four indoor and 17 outdoor arenas.
