In this issue
As the Adelaide Equestrian Festival returns, rising Australian eventer Samuel Jeffree prepares for a defining week, balancing five-star ambitions, team representation and long-term goals built on precision, planning and an unwavering drive to improve.
Ancient desert traditions, cultural identity and modern science converge in Turkmenistan’s training of the Akhal-Teke, a breed shaped by endurance, loyalty and survival, and still produced through a unique system refined over three millennia.
Australian dressage rider Hope Beerling is forging her own path in the United States, balancing a growing business, top young horse success, and exciting personal milestones — all while developing the next horse she hopes will take her to championship level.
Balancing a demanding legal career with elite-level eventing, US-based Australian Ema Klugman has enjoyed a strong start to the spring eventing season with her team as she targets the Kentucky Three-Day Event – and potential World Championship team selection.
Australia’s dressage contenders are intensifying their push for selection ahead of the 2026 FEI World Championships in Aachen, with scores, consistency and international experience shaping a competitive race for the four available team places.
In elite dressage, we often celebrate the finished product: the polished Grand Prix test, the effortless piaffe, the seemingly seamless partnership between horse and rider. What we speak about far less is the road that gets us there – the messy, uncertain, often uncomfortable journey where instinct, patience and resilience matter far more than scoresheets. Few horses embody that reality more vividly than Lets Chance It.
There were many exciting storylines to emerge from the 2026 P.S.I. Dressage and Jumping with the Stars — and one of those is the rise of Robbie McKinnon’s mare, QS Sierra.
Equestrian performance psychologist Deena Cooper answers a reader's sports psychology question: “I never have trouble running through a dressage test at home, but when I enter the competition arena my mind goes blank, and I struggle to remember the test. What can I do to overcome this?”
Films about real-life showjumping horses are rare. Back in the 1960s there was The Horse with the Flying Tail about Hugh Wiley’s Nautical; in 2013 a French feature based on Jappeloup, then Harry and Snowman made a few years later. Now, there is Big Star – the Nick Skelton Story.
Ulcers are not a one-size-fits-all diagnosis or solution; Dr Peter Huntington of Kentucky Equine Research highlights the need for tailored, long-term equine gut health management beyond acid suppression.
For more than four decades, Insa Hansen has been a defining figure at Hof Kasselmann in Hagen, Germany. Her name stands for horsemanship, consistency, and the very highest professional standards within the sport of dressage.
If you aren't improving between your dressage lessons, the problem probably isn't your coach, but your system.
If you ask the average non-horse person how hard horse riding is, they would probably say, ‘Can’t be that hard, you just sit there’. As riders we know this is very far from the truth. Pilates, I believe, is the missing link. It has certainly kept me in the game.
Stay tuned for additional March magazine features throughout the month.