Dressage is a form of horse riding performed in exhibition and competition, as well as an art sometimes pursued solely for the sake of mastery. As an equestrian sport defined by the International Equestrian Federation, dressage is described as "the highest expression of horse training" where "horse and rider are expected to perform from memory a series of predetermined movements".
A horse show is a judged exhibition of horses and ponies. Many different horse breeds and equestrian disciplines hold competitions worldwide, from local to the international levels. Most horse shows run from one to three days, sometimes longer for major, all-breed events or national and international championships in a given discipline or breed. Most shows consist of a series of different performances, called classes, wherein a group of horses with similar training or characteristics compete against one another for awards and, often, prize money.
Brentina was an Olympic-level dressage horse ridden by Debbie McDonald. She was owned by E. Parry Thomas.
Robert Jeffrey Dover is an American equestrian who has had international success in the sport of dressage. Riding from the age of 13, he began specializing in dressage at age 19 and competed in his first Olympics in 1984. He competed in every summer Games between 1984 and 2004, winning four team bronze medals. He also took a team bronze at the 1994 World Equestrian Games. Dover is the most honored dressage rider in the United States, and has been inducted to the United States Dressage Federation Hall of Fame. Outside of competition, Dover founded the Equestrian Aid Foundation in 1996 to assist others in the equestrian world, and hosted a TV show that searched for the next dressage star. From late 2009 to early 2011, Dover served as the Technical/Coach Advisor for the Canadian national dressage team. In April 2013, Dover was named Technical Advisor/Chef d'Equipe for the US national dressage team.
Andreas Helgstrand is a Danish dressage rider. He won four consecutive Danish dressage championships, from 2005 through 2008.
Isabell Werth is a German equestrian and world champion in dressage who competed in the Olympics seven times winning fourteen medals, eight of them gold. With this she beat Aladar Gerevich, Hungarian fencer and Mark Todd of New Zealand, record for the most years between first and last Olympic medals. She holds the record for the most Olympic medals won by any equestrian athlete and by any German athlete, and is the first athlete to win a medal at seven different Olympic Games editions.
McLain Ward is an American show jumping competitor and five-time Olympic medalist.
Ingrid Klimke is a German eventing rider. She appeared at five Olympics from 2000 to 2016. With her horse Abraxxas, she won two gold medals in team eventing at the 2008 Summer Olympics and the 2012 Summer Olympics. At the 2016 Summer Olympics, she won a team silver with Hale-Bob.
Edward Gal is a Dutch dressage rider. He and the stallion Totilas, were triple gold medalists at the 2010 FEI World Equestrian Games, becoming the first horse-rider partnership ever to sweep the three available dressage gold medals at a single FEI World Games. Going into the 2010 Games, they had amassed multiple world-record scores in international competition, leading one American journalist to call them "rock stars in the horse world". After the World Equestrian Games, Totilas was sold to German trainer Paul Schockemöhle. Gal continues to be successful training and competing dressage horses at the international level. Despite the success, he has been criticised to be harsh trainer who creates stressed and fearful horses.
Totilas, also known from 2006 to 2011 as Moorlands Totilas, and nicknamed "Toto", was a Dutch Warmblood stallion standing 17.1 hands high who was considered to be one of the most outstanding competitive dressage horses in the world, the first horse to score above 90 in dressage competition, and the former holder of the world record for the highest dressage score in Grand Prix Freestyle Dressage.
Laura Tomlinson MBE is a German-British dressage rider competing at Olympic level. As of 30 June 2012 the Fédération Équestre Internationale (FEI) ranked her 3rd in the world riding Mistral Højris and 36th on Andretti H. In that year, Tomlinson, riding Mistral Højris under her maiden name of Laura Bechtolsheimer, won two medals in the 2012 Summer Olympics in London; gold for Great Britain in the team dressage with Carl Hester and Charlotte Dujardin, the first ever Olympic team gold in the discipline for her country, and bronze in the individual dressage behind gold medalist and compatriot Dujardin.
Steffen Peters is a German-born equestrian who competes for the United States in dressage. He has participated in five Olympic Games, winning a team bronze medal on two occasions and a team silver medal once (2020). Peters has been successful in numerous other international competitions, including winning team bronze at the 2006 World Equestrian Games, two individual bronze medals at the 2010 World Equestrian Games and individual and team gold medals at both 2011 and 2015 Pan Am Games. The horse upon which he won many of his titles, Ravel, was retired in 2012. After 2012, his international successes came on Legolas. At the beginning of 2017, Peters handed over the ride on Legolas to his assistant rider Dawn White-O'Connor. Peters is currently working with a new international competition horse, Rosamunde.
Charlotte Susan Jane Dujardin is a British dressage rider, equestrian, and writer. A multiple World and Olympic champion, Dujardin has been described as the dominant dressage rider of her era. She held the complete set of available individual elite dressage titles at one point: the individual Olympic freestyle, World freestyle and Grand Prix Special, World Cup individual dressage and European freestyle, and Grand Prix Special titles. Dujardin was the first rider to hold this complete set of titles at the same time.
Dr. Cesar Parra is a Colombian-American dressage rider and coach.
Laura Graves is an American dressage rider. She represented the United States at the 2016 Summer Olympics where she won a bronze medal in the team dressage competition. After winning double silver medals at the 2018 World Equestrian Games in Tryon, NC, Laura became the first American dressage rider to be ranked No. 1 in FEI World rankings, aboard her longtime partner Verdades.
Sharon Jarvis is an Australian para-equestrian. She represented Australia at the three Summer Paralympics - 2008 Beijing, 2016 Rio and 2020 Tokyo.
Lucy Davis is an American show jumping competitor and 2016 Olympian.
Kelly Layne is an Australian Dressage rider and trainer. She planned on qualifying to represent her country at the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro. However, Layne was unable to compete in the final qualifying event due to an injury suffered by her horse, Udon P, forcing her to withdraw. While born in Australia, Layne is currently based in Wellington, Florida. Layne also helped found her own riding team, "Dream Team Dressage".
Richard Rankin Fellers is an American former Olympic equestrian and horse trainer. In 2023 he pled guilty to sexually abusing one of his students when she was 17. According to the Washington County, Oregon district attorney, he will serve 30 months in state prison concurrently with a four year federal sentence.
Lillie Carmichael Keenan is an American show jumping rider. As a junior rider she won the ASPCA Maclay Finals, the USEF Medal Finals, and the Washington International Horse Show Equitation championship, as well as the USHJA International Hunter Derby Finals and double gold at the North American Young Rider Championship.
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