German dressage rider Benjamin Werndl has paid tribute to his medal-winning ride Famoso OLD, who has been put down after a field accident. Benjamin said the 15-year-old gelding fractured a leg and there was no way of saving him. The combination were on the team that won bronze at the 2022 World Championships, and “still had so much to do, especially this year”, Benjamin said, adding: ““He was the undisputed king in my stable and made all the horses and people around him feel this in a loving and mischievous way. He really enjoyed his life in Aubenhausen and I would have loved to give him so many more years with us.”
One of those due to come down the centre line at the Petplan Winter Area Festival Championships this month will be a pony who is thriving after three separate surgeries. April Joynson and Bryntegllwynau Rocky Robin, 17, are to contest the elementary silver, for which they qualified on Robin’s first show back after his last operation. The part-bred Welsh pony has had colic surgery and two palmar annular ligament operations. “My little £4,000 pony is worth a million dollars to me and I wouldn’t swap him for the world,” she said.
A leading equine welfare charity has “serious concerns” over hoof care. Bransby Horses told H&H it was worried by the number of cases of hoof neglect the charity saw last year – which is continuing in 2024. “In 2023 more than half of the animals involved had to be put to sleep due to the severity of their condition,” a spokesman said, adding that four horses had to be put down last year as a result
Benjamin WERNDL (GER) riding Famoso OLD during the Grand Prix for the Blue Hors FEI World Dressage Team Championship at the ECCO FEI World Championships in Herning in Denmark between 6th - 14th August 2022
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Eleanor is an experienced journalist who spent over eight years working for local and national newspapers before joining H&H as news editor in March 2016. Passionate about equine welfare and exposing the truth, Eleanor has reported on all aspects of the industry, from Brexit to anti-bullying campaigns, and from dressage rules to mules. Her sport of choice is showjumping, in which she competes her own horses, and she also enjoys reporting at local jumping shows through to international championships.
