by Nancy Jaffer | Dec 31, 2025
As the new year gallops toward us, let’s take a little half-halt to look back on 2025 and see where we’ve been, before we turn our attention to where we’re going.
At the high end, the wealthy who want to participate in horse sports are doing just fine, as you would expect. But it’s a different story not only for those aspiring to the highest levels of sport without a bankroll, but also for almost anyone else seeking significant equestrian involvement. Where are the backyard stables, as well as facilities that cater to beginners or trail riders? They have disappeared, or often seem to be in the process of doing so.
Concerns over the cost of showing — and indeed — even of keeping horses, have dominated thoughts in 2025 as never before. The worries rose to new levels and seem destined to continue on that course unless some answers are found. Don’t expect one solution, however. There are unique ways to handle the situation for different segments of the equestrian sports population. New groups, such as the United Dressage and Jumping Club, are putting forward alternative concepts, trimming cash outlays while avoiding the sport’s governing bodies. And now there’s even a new U.S. Equestrian Trainers Association.
Thoroughbred racing also is having well-publicized troubles. It is interesting to see how a group in Florida is trying to find a way forward in that state, where the future of the state’s largest track is under threat. Whether it’s showing, horse-keeping or racing, many need to focus and contribute their thoughts.
On the controversy front, enactment of a new international rule concerning blood on show jumpers in competition will not end the conversation about this difficult subject among other disciplines. In the era of social license to operate, horse sport has to worry about public acceptance, as well as what’s right for the horses.
In September, the U.S. Equestrian Federation released a set of horse welfare guidelines under the title, “Protecting Horses.”
Some high-profile abuse cases also were resolved in 2025. U.S. dressage rider Cesar Parra was suspended for 15 years “for violating principles of horse welfare,” resolving accusations that received massive publicity and comment. In another abuse case, it was a 20-month suspension for eventer Andrew McConnon after a public outcry.
In happier news on the competition front, dressage has a deserving new number one, modest Belgian role model Justin Verboomen, who carefully brought along Zonik Plus from an untrained two-year-old to a superstar earning scores over 90 percent. He is the European Champion and has his eye on the 2026 world championships.
Justin Verboomen enjoys a special link with Zonik Plus.
Great Britain’s Scott Brash defied the odds with Hello Jefferson to win the world’s richest (and most difficult) show jumping grand prix, the $5 million (Canadian) CPKC International, on top of gaining attention for a brilliant comeback when he lost his reins for a moment in the European Championships. He went on to win the International Jumper Riders Club top 10 competition in December.
A change of venue for the 2028 Olympic equestrian competition was announced, which meant the hosting will be done by Santa Anita racetrack, where McLain Ward won the grand prix in November against the magnificent backdrop of the San Gabriel mountains.
Santa Anita
For U.S. high performance, this was a year without major international championships — the Olympics were in 2024, the world championships are in 2026 and the Pan American Games in 2027. But jumper riders distinguished themselves anyway; Kent Farrington ended the year as world number one, Laura Kraut is the world’s highest-ranked female jumper rider at number seven and Karl Cook won the grands prix of Rotterdam, Netherlands, and Falsterbo, Sweden.
In the dressage rankings, Christian Simonson was the highest-ranked U.S. rider at number 15, making an enormous leap from number 151. Boyd Martin was world number two in eventing, while Cosby Green clinched the tenth spot.
A landmark of 2025 saw the new USEF Open competitions in the Olympic disciplines make their debut in Virginia, California and Florida.
As is often the case these days, children of professional equestrians took major equitation titles. JJ Torano, the 2024 Dover Saddlery/USEF Medal winner, added the ASPCA Maclay to his collection. He’s the son of show jumpers Jimmy and Danielle Torano. Olivia Sweetnam, the daughter of Irish show jumper Shane Sweetnam and his wife, Ali Sweetnam, won the Dover Saddlery/USEF Medal.
Milestones during the year included the fiftieth anniversary of Dressage at Devon, and the hundredth of Union County, N.J.’s Watchung Stables, happily bucking the trend that has closed so many lesson facilities.
Ben Ebeling gives a thumbs up during Dressage at Devon’s 50th anniversary.
The Winter Equestrian Festival showgrounds in Wellington, Fla., got new life after a complete refurbishment, with more to come, after its former owners bought it back.
Several key people left leadership positions in 2025. Karyn Malinowski, the founding director of the Rutgers Equine Science Center took a well-deserved retirement. Desert International Horse Park made headlines at the end of July with the sudden departure of CEO Steve Hankin, whose leadership had given a new identity to the former HITS Thermal, Calif., facility. And the CEO of the Maryland 5-star event departed, as did several others connected to that competition. (Read more at this link.)
Horses who retired included Explosion W, British rider Ben Maher’s 2021 Olympic individual gold medal show jumping mount, and Tamie Smith’s ride, Kentucky 5-star winner Mai Baum.
Mai Baum.
New Jersey’s Essex Horse Trials, a competition that has had plenty of ups and downs during its long history, returned as a one-day fixture with great success. Trainer and judge Marilyn Payne was determined to keep it going, despite fears it would not be held again.
Moorland Farm is a special venue for the Essex Horse Trials.
As always, we take extra time to think about the special people and horses we lost during the year. Click this link to read a story about those who passed away over the last 12 months. If you want more detail on the year gone by, click on the “previous columns” link on the masthead of this website and scroll through our coverage. You can do the same with the On the Rail archives.
by Nancy Jaffer | Jan 2, 2026
Ian Balding, the British trainer of the great Mill Reef among many top-class horses, has died at the age of 87.
A social media post from Park House Stables called him, “A wonderful family man, a hugely successful racehorse trainer and a brilliant sportsman.
He was champion trainer in 1971, the year when Paul Mellon’s homebred Mill Reef won the Derby, Eclipse, King George VI and Queen Elizabeth Stakes, and Prix de l’Arc de Triomphe.
A second-generation trainer and a successful rider over jumps as an amateur, in 2002 he passed the Park House Stables license to his son, Andrew, now a multiple Classic-winning trainer in his own right.
His daughter, Clare Balding, is a broadcaster and author.
In a tribute to her father on Instagram, she said, “My Dad was one of a kind. Fearless, funny and charming, he was an all-round sportsman, a great trainer and a beautiful horseman. He loved his dogs, his horses and his family – probably in that order. He shared with me his passion for sport and taught me to be brave enough to chase a dream, even if it seemed impossible. We’ll miss him so much.”
by Nancy Jaffer | Jan 4, 2026
The world’s number one-ranked show jumper, Kent Farrington, has won yet another grand prix — but this time with a new horse.
On Saturday at the World Equestrian Center in Ocala, the U.S. star topped a field of 28 with a skillfully executed jump-off on Descartes, a horse he doesn’t know well but is figuring out fast. And fast he was in the six-horse tiebreaker, with a fault-free trip in 43.338 seconds that clinched victory in the $75,000 national grand prix over a 1.50 meter course designed by Oscar Soberon.
Recounting how he and his mount found each other, Kent said, “Francisco Pasquel called me and said he has an unbelievable horse in Mexico for me, and said I had to come and ride it. So, I flew to Mexico to ride the horse and here we are.”
Kent Farrington and Descartes. (Andrew Ryback Photography)
With limited mileage as a pair, Farrington kept his jump-off plan simple.
“He has a giant stride and a great canter, so I just trusted it and did my round,” Kent said.
That trust paid off as the 9-year-old Mexican-bred gelding galloped effortlessly around the short course, stopping the clock clear in 43.338 seconds to take over the top spot. Tracy Fenney was close, but not close enough, on MTM Apple in 43.970.
Descartes previously was ridden by Nikolaj Hein Ruus of Denmark. The horse’s best effort with that rider in 2025 came in April with a third-place finish at 1.35 meters in a Guadalajara 4-star competition.
Click here for results
by Nancy Jaffer | Dec 26, 2025
Between the celebration of Christmas and new year’s eve champagne toasts, let’s take a few minutes to think about the people and horses who sadly left us over the last 12 months. They deserve our attention in a final salute, recalling their achievements and what they contributed to our world.
At the end of 2025, dressage lost several superstars, horses whose names bring instant recognition.
The U.S. dressage community mourned the death of Laura Graves’ Verdades at age 23 this month. Laura brought Diddy up from an unruly foal to a champion who teamed with her to be the only world number one-ranked combination ever in dressage for this country.
Along the way, the two triumphed over some devastating setbacks, but dedication to correct training set a fine example of what could be achieved with determination and love, as well as the help and advice of strong supporters.
Britain’s dressage duo of Valegro and Uthopia, in the same age demographic as Verdades, departed in November. Under the guidance of Carl Hester, the two horses helped put Britain squarely at the top of the global dressage hierarchy for the first time at the 2012 London Olympics. (Another member of the gold medal team, Mistral Højris, died at age 30 in March).
Carl rode Uti in front of a home crowd at those Games, while Charlotte Dujardin guided Valegro. The two horses were close companions, and Carl wanted them to end their lives that way rather than being separated when their health deteriorated.
Valegro and Uthopia
Influential show jumping stallion Indoctro died in April at the age of 35 after siring 4,335 horses registered with KWPN. The Holsteiner by Capitol out of a Caletto II mare had dressage offspring to his credit as well.
Also in what poet T.S. Eliot called the cruelest month, we lost Authentic at the age of 30. Beezie Madden’s mount,was her partner in taking two Olympic team gold medals in 2004 and 2008 for the U.S., as well as an individual bronze at the Games and double silver at the world championships. Bud was retired in 2009 and lived happily with Beezie and her husband, John, at their upstate New York farm.
Beezie Madden and Authentic at the 2008 Olympics.
And now we will reminisce, month by month, about the people who departed this year. We did individual obituaries about them as the year progressed, but you really understand the scope of the loss by seeing their names all in one place, for the same sad reason.
January: Stylish and effective show jumper and hunter rider Terry Rudd, driver Muffy Seaton and Paul Cronin. Paul was director of the riding program at Sweet Briar College from 1967 through 2002, but he also contributed to horsemanship in a wider perspective as an author. His 2004 volume, “Schooling and Riding the Sport Horse,” is a classic that covers the American forward seat riding system.
March: Michelle Bloch, a gifted writer who was a mainstay of the Capital Challenge Horse Show; announcer Mike Moran, three-time endurance world champion Becky Hart, hunter rider and judge Brian Flynn and dressage trainer Vera Kessels.
April: Dr. Allen Leslie, 84, an FEI veterinary official and the U.S. Eventing Team veterinarian at the 1968 Mexico City Olympics. A lifetime rider, he completed the Tevis Cup endurance ride, competed in point-to-points and fox hunted.
Dressage trainer and author Charles de Kunffy, 88. His outstanding book, “Dressage Principles Illuminated,” is a distillation of the classical horsemanship tradition.
Lois Walter, a founder of Beval Saddlery who was always a guiding force and a welcoming presence there.
Lana DuPont Wright, 85, the first woman to compete in eventing at the Olympics. She also was involved with endurance and driving, while serving as co-president of the Fair Hill International event.
Eclectic horsewoman Lana DuPont Wright.
Trakehner breeder Tim Holekamp, whose Windfall and Tsetserleg were part of many U.S. eventing teams. He was very involved with the U.S. Eventing Association’s Young Event Horse program.
June: Hunter breeder Diana Dodge, international dressage competitor Belinda Nairn Wertman and Mary Alice Malone, 75. A pioneer in the importation of European warmbloods to the U.S., Mary Alice amassed an enormous record of success in a half-century of her efforts at Iron Spring Farm in Pennsylvania. Her horses took many honors internationally, and were seen everywhere from the Olympics and World Cup Finals to the Paralympics and driving championships.
In thoroughbred racing, Hall of Fame trainer D. Wayne Lukas, 89.
July: Cecile Hetzel Dunn, 89, who was involved with Arabians, Friesians, Andalusians and saddlebreds, spent decades working as a licensed official and volunteering with a variety of governing bodies. She was a mainstay of the U.S. Equestrian Federation’s board of directors.
Cecile Dunn accepted the USEF’s Lifetime Achievement Award from David O’Connor.
August: Mary Anne McPhail, 92, who was instrumental in creating the Florida dressage circuit that contributed to the discipline’s unprecedented growth in the U.S. She was devoted to the Dressage Foundation, where she was a volunteer committee member for more than 20 years, With her husband, Mary Anne established the Mary Anne and Walter McPhail Judge Education Fund to provide support for the U.S. Dressage Federation’s judge education initiative.
Mary Anne McPhail.
Linda Andrisani, an influential trainer and hunter judge who also was known for her fashion sense.
In thoroughbred racing, Ron Turcotte, 84, the jockey who guided Secretariat to the Triple Crown in 1973.
September: Coaching stalwart Dr. Donald Rosato.
October: Lu Thomas, 79, a trainer and rider who worked as a team with her husband, Butch, and was a key figure in the California horse hunter/jumper industry.
December: Adrienne Cotter, former executive vice president of the American Horse Shows Association.
Judith Hennessy, 89, the first woman to groom for the U.S. Equestrian Team, who went on to be a mentor for youth in 4-H programs. She shared her extensive horse care knowledge with the 4-H members to insure they knew how to take care of their animals the right way.
by Nancy Jaffer | Dec 19, 2025
You may know her best as an interviewer and analyst on the live stream, but Jessica Kürten has just been appointed Horse Sport Ireland’s new High Performance Jumping Manager, succeeding Michael Blake.
One of Ireland’s most accomplished, and influential figures in international show jumping, Jessica brings an exceptional blend of elite competitive pedigree, advanced coaching expertise, leadership experience, and global governance insight to the role.
Jessica Kürten
A former world number two in the FEI rankings, Jessica is a dual Olympian who represented Ireland at the Atlanta Olympic Games in 1996 and at Athens in 2004. She was a key member of Ireland’s historic European Championship gold-medal winning team in 2001. She is also an Aga Khan Trophy winner for Ireland (at the Dublin Horse Show) and was a regular representative at World Cups and major championship events, earning her place as one of Ireland’s most successful and respected international riders of her generation.
Jessica said: “I am absolutely delighted to have been appointed as Ireland’s new High Performance Jumping Manager. Ireland has a strong track record in jumping and I look forward to working closely with all members of the team, with HSI and with all the other stakeholders to ensure that we put ourselves in the best possible position.
“I am hugely excited about our prospects for the World Championships next year and for the European Championships (2027) and Olympics in 2028.
“I have been involved in equestrian sport for 40 years, and I will bring all of my experience to fostering a collaborative and successful culture within the Irish team.”
HSI Chief Executive Denis Duggan,said: “Jessica Kürten is one of the most iconic figures in Irish jumping, and her record speaks for itself. A former world number two, dual Olympian, European champion and Aga Khan winner, she brings unrivaled experience as an elite athlete who understands exactly what it takes to succeed at the highest level.
“Her combination of competitive excellence, coaching expertise, leadership experience and international governance knowledge will further strengthen Ireland’s position on the world stage.”
Since stepping away from competing, Kürten has remained deeply connected to elite sport. A HSI Level 3 Coach, she is widely recognized for her technical expertise, performance insight and ability to develop riders across youth, development and senior levels. Her advanced coaching qualifications, combined with her first-hand experience of championship environments, position her uniquely to lead Ireland’s High Performance Jumping program through the next World Championship cycle and forward to the Olympic Games in 2028.
Jessica served as team manager of the Prague Lions in the Global Champions League for three years, overseeing high-performance athletes and support teams in high-pressure international environments. In addition, she currently acts as Athlete Representative on the FEI Board, contributing to international governance, athlete welfare and high-performance policy, giving her an exceptional understanding of the global jumping landscape.
Highly regarded worldwide as a broadcaster and expert analyst, Jessica has also built a respected media career, offering insightful commentary at major international events. Her communication skills, tactical understanding and ability to articulate complex performance concepts will add further strength to the role when representing Irish jumping on the world stage.
In her new position, Jessica will be responsible for the planning, delivery and performance of Ireland’s senior jumping program, working closely with athletes, coaches and support teams to build on Ireland’s recent international success, while strengthening the pathway from youth and development squads through to senior Nations Cups and championships.
Duggan noted: “On behalf of Horse Sport Ireland, I would like to thank Michael (Blake) for his dedication, commitment and passion for Irish sport, and to wish him every success in the next chapter of his career.”
Horse Sport Ireland expressed confidence that Jessica’s experience, insight, international standing and leadership will provide continuity and momentum, while also bringing a fresh, forward-looking perspective to the High Performance Jumping program at a pivotal point in the Olympic and championship cycle.
by Nancy Jaffer | Dec 21, 2025
It has been an incredible year for the low-key world number one Justin Verboomen of Belgium and his fabulous Hanoverian stallion Zonik Plus, with victories at Aachen and the European Championships. On Sunday, the duo finished their year in the same style, with a personal best score in the freestyle at Frankfurt to edge Danish powerhouse Mount St. John Freestyle with world number three Catherine Laudrup-Dufour riding.
Both horses were graded at more than 90 percent, but Zonik’s splendid mark was just a touch better at 91.195 percent, versus the Hanoverian mare’s 91.085 percent. The crowd went crazy applauding for Justin’s one-handed passage down centerline to his final halt.
Third place went to Germany’s eternal Isabell Werth, the world number two, on Wendy de Fontaine, further back at 87.165 percent. That normally would be a spectacular score and a winning one, but the two powerhouses at the top of the class are in a category that belongs to them.
The idea of the competition was to face off the discipline’s top 12 against each other, but among the missing were British riders Lottie Fry (Glamourdale) the world number five, and Becky Moody (Jagerbomb), world number five, were otherwise engaged at their home competition, the London International. They finished 1-2 there, but Lottie did not make it into the 90 percent range, though she came close. Read about it at this link
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