Dressage-News

STUTTGART, Germany, Nov. 12, 2022–German double Olympic Eventing team gold medalist Ingrid Klimke rode Franziskus FRH to a personal best score to win the World Cup Grand Prix Freestyle for the second victory in her campaign for a start in the Final at Omaha.

Ingrid and Franziskus, a 14-year-old Hanoverian stallion, scored 83.440% with Isabell Werth on DSP Quantaz, a 12-year-old German Sport Horse stallion, runner-up on 82.030%.

The two riders and horses were team mates on the world championships bronze medal squad three months ago. Ingrid, is 54 years old and Isabell 53.

Fellow German team riders, Benjamin Werndl and the 18-year-old gelding Daily Mirror was third on 81.885%, Frederic Wandres on Bluetooth OLD, 12-year-old Oldenburg gelding, fourth on 81.885% and Dorothee Schneider on Faustus, 14-year-old gelding, in fifth on 80.290%.

Defending World Cup champion Jessica von Bredow-Werndl and Ferdinand BB scored 78.205% for the rider’s second World Cup qualifier that fulfills the requirement to go to Omaha as the champion. Jessica and TSF Dalera BB, No. 1 rider and No. 1 horse in the world, won the title last year as the pair did for the team and individual gold medals at the Tokyo Olympics and all three golds at the 2021 European Championships.

The latest results put Benjamin Werndl at the top of the Western European League that gets nine of the 18 starting places in Omaha, with 50 points; Ingrid Klimke on 40 points and Isabell on 37. Patrik Kittel of Sweden stands in fourth place and Nanna Merrald Rasmussen of Denmark in fifth.

However, this was just the third of 11 qualifiers for the Omaha Final next April. The next stop on the winter indoor circuit is Madrid in two weeks.

Ingrid is the daughter of the late Reiner Klimke, one of the most successful dressage riders in history with five Olympic team gold medals and an individual gold at Los Angeles in 1984.

Franziskus (Fidertanz 2 x Alabaster) has been competed by Ingrid on the international stage for the past nine years beginning with the world six-year-old championships in 2014 and launching their Big Tour career in 2017.

In the five Olympics since her first in Sydney in 2000, Ingrid won team gold at the 2008 Games in Hong Kong and 2012 in London and silver in Rio de Janeiro in 2016. She also was on four World Equestrian Games teams beginning winning team golds at Aachen, Germany in 2006 and Normandy, France in 2014 as well as individual bronze at Tryon in 2018. She has also captured numerous medals of different colors at world and continental championships.

Prior to the world championship team dressage bronze at Herning, Denmark this summer her only other international dressage championship was at the World Cup Final in 2002.

However, she has competed horses in German dressage championships.

CDI-W World Cup Grand Prix Freestyle