Verdades, the former world number one US dressage horse who won double world silver and an Olympic team bronze with Laura Graves, has died aged 23.
“I never thought this day would come. You were invincible,” said his rider Laura Graves yesterday (22 December).
Laura’s parents Ron and Freddie bought Verdades (Diddy) as a foal from the Netherlands and Laura produced him up the levels. But this was not without its challenges; Diddy was known for his sensitive nature. He broke his jaw as a young horse when he caught a tooth on a metal bar and pulled back, and he was known to frighten himself when he flicked the arena surface onto his chest with his hooves.
“None of these things made sense, but the actual feeling you got from the day he was backed was like he was trained — he just came round and went forward and it was like he knew what to do,” said Laura, in a 2018 interview.
Laura and Diddy made their international grand prix debut in 2014, and the same year started training with Debbie McDonald, a turning point for the pair.
“I was riding a national grand prix. We missed all of our changes, the piaffes weren’t happening, I had no money and I was walking back to the barn feeling totally defeated,” said Laura.
“Debbie came running up behind me and said, ‘Laura, I want to train you.’ I had been taking some lessons with her but she was always so busy. She said: ‘Any time you want a lesson, you just call me.’ That was the day it all changed.”
Laura and Diddy made their championship debut at the 2014 World Equestrian Games in Caen, where the US team finished fourth. Two years later they were part of the team that won bronze at the Rio Olympics, and finished fourth individually.
The pair continued to go from strength to strength. They started 2017 with back-to-back World Cup wins on home soil, and that summer they helped the US team to victory in the Rotterdam Nations Cup leg, where Laura and Diddy won the grand prix and freestyle.
In April 2018 they posted a personal best 89.08% freestyle in the Paris World Cup leg, then went on to win team and individual silver at the World Equestrian Games, in Tryon. Following this, they became the first American combination to top the FEI dressage world rankings.
Laura and Diddy’s final international competition was the Gothenburg World Cup leg in April 2019, they were runners-up in the grand prix and freestyle, on 80.11% and 87.18% respectively.
“Thank you for choosing me and being my friend for 23 years. I don’t know what a day looks like without you,” said Laura.
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