‘Better and fresher than ever’: how an 18-year-old veteran horse blitzed to third place on showjumping’s world stage

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Catch Me Not, the 18 year old horse who finished third at the World Cup Finals with Peder Fredricson
Peder Fredricson’s 18-year-old Catch Me Not S jumping at the FEI World Cup Final.
(Image credit: FEI/Martin Dokoupil)

Jumping in a Longines FEI World Cup Final requires horses to be at the absolute peak of their powers, in prime athletic condition. The winner of this year’s renewal in Saudi Arabia (16–20 April), King Edward, is 14 years old; the runner-up Dubai Du Cedre 11. The average age of the top-16 in the final standings is 12 – which makes the achievement of the third-placed horse, Catch Me Not S, all the more remarkable.

Peder Fredricson’s 18-year-old finished second in both the speed and the jump-off classes at the finals leading up to the decider, where he lowered one pole in round one to slip to third overall.

Martha Terry
Martha Terry
Features editor

Martha is an experienced journalist who is mad-keen on horses and dogs. Her reporting CV includes the Paris Olympics, European championships, Aachen World Equestrian Festival and World Cup finals. After growing up with assorted liver and white springer spaniels, she enjoyed 14 years with two rescue dogs. Now, her constant companion is Fidget, an extremely energetic and habitually muddy black and white springer. Martha has written on topics as diverse as a top horse’s clone to the best GPS trackers for dogs, as well as equestrian and rural matters for Country Life, The Field, The Times, The Spectator and The Telegraph alongside Horse & Hound.