Skip to content

Home / History / Notable riders and horses

Riders and horses

Notable riders and horses.

This page lists the riders and horses that the sources single out: Olympic champions in dressage, jumping and eventing, the most decorated riders, the record holders, and the winners of eventing's Grand Slam. Each count carries the date of the source it comes from.

Medal counts change with every Games, so each count below names its source and, where the source gives one, its date. Full results of recent championships are in the Events section.

Olympic dressage

Individual Olympic dressage champions in Wikipedia's list of medallists include:

GamesRiderHorse
1912Carl Bonde (Sweden)Emperor
1952, 1956Henri Saint Cyr (Sweden)Master Rufus (1952), Juli (1956)
1972Liselott Linsenhoff (West Germany)Piaff
1976Christine Stuckelberger (Switzerland)Granat
1984Reiner Klimke (West Germany)Ahlerich
1988, 1992Nicole UphoffRembrandt
1996Isabell Werth (Germany)Gigolo
2000, 2004, 2008Anky van Grunsven (Netherlands)Bonfire (2000), Salinero (2004, 2008)
2012, 2016Charlotte Dujardin (Great Britain)Valegro
2020, 2024Jessica von Bredow-Werndl (Germany)Dalera

Linsenhoff's win in 1972 makes her the first woman on Wikipedia's list of individual dressage champions, and van Grunsven's three wins in a row from 2000 to 2008 stand out in the same list.

Isabell Werth

Guinness World Records credits Werth with the most Olympic dressage golds, eight, the last won in the team event at Paris on 3 August 2024. Guinness lists them as team gold in 1992, individual and team in 1996, and team gold in 2000, 2008, 2016, 2021 (the Tokyo 2020 Games) and 2024. Her total medal count is less clear: Wikipedia's list gives her 10 medals, 6 of them gold, ahead of van Grunsven (9 medals, 3 gold) and Klimke (8 medals, 6 gold), but those figures predate Tokyo and Paris. We could not confirm her total after 2024.

Valegro's scores

Dressage-News reported that on 17 December 2013 at London Olympia, Charlotte Dujardin and Valegro set a Grand Prix Freestyle world record of 93.975 percent, beating the 92.300 percent set by Edward Gal and Totilas at the same show on 16 December 2009, and that the pair then held the Grand Prix (85.942) and Grand Prix Special (88.022) records as well. Guinness World Records lists 94.3 percent, set by the same pair at the Olympia World Cup leg on 17 December 2014, as the highest dressage freestyle score. We did not check whether it still stands in 2026.

Dujardin's 2024 suspension by the FEI is recorded on welfare controversies.

Olympic jumping

Individual Olympic jumping champions in Wikipedia's list include:

GamesRiderHorse
1900Aime Haegeman (Belgium)Benton II
1912Jacques Cariou (France)Mignon
1932Takeichi Nishi (Japan)Uranus
1948Humberto Mariles Cortes (Mexico)Arete
1952, 1964Pierre Jonqueres d'Oriola (France)Ali Baba (1952), Lutteur (1964)
1956Hans Gunter Winkler (Germany)Halla
1960Raimondo D'Inzeo (Italy)Posillipo
1968William Steinkraus (USA)Snowbound
1988Pierre Durand (France)Jappeloup
1992Ludger Beerbaum (Germany)Classic Touch
2004Rodrigo Pessoa (Brazil)Baloubet du Rouet
2008Eric Lamaze (Canada)Hickstead
2012Steve Guerdat (Switzerland)Nino des Buissonnets
2016Nick Skelton (Great Britain)Big Star
2020Ben Maher (Great Britain)Explosion W
2024Christian Kukuk (Germany)Checker 47

D'Oriola is the only rider in the list to win the individual title twice. Pessoa's 2004 title came after the first-placed rider was disqualified, as told on equestrian sport at the Olympics.

Winkler and Halla

Olympedia records that Hans Gunter Winkler (24 July 1926 to 9 July 2018) won seven Olympic medals, five of them gold: individual and team gold in 1956 on Halla, team gold in 1960 on Halla, in 1964 on Fidelitas and in 1972 on Torphy, plus team bronze in 1968 and team silver in 1976. It also says he won the first two World Championships in show jumping, in 1954 and 1955. At Stockholm in 1956, Olympedia says, Winkler tore a groin muscle in the first round and was tied onto Halla for the second, which she jumped clear; summaries of Wikipedia's article tell the injury differently on whether he was tied on. Olympedia calls Halla the only horse to carry a rider to three Olympic golds.

The high jump record

Guinness World Records, citing the FEI, gives the official high jump record as 2.47 m, cleared by Huaso ex-Faithful ridden by Captain Alberto Larraguibel Morales of Chile at Vina del Mar on 5 February 1949. The FEI said 2.49 m would have to be cleared to beat it.

Guerdat in 2026

Steve Guerdat, Olympic champion in 2012, won the individual title at the 2026 World Championships in Aachen on 23 August on Dynamix de Belheme (Jumper News, 23 August 2026). The FEI's release headline, seen as a search summary, called him the first Swiss rider to win the individual jumping world title.

Olympic eventing

Olympedia's count after Paris 2024: Charles Pahud de Mortanges of the Netherlands and Michael Jung of Germany each have four Olympic eventing golds and five medals, while Andrew Hoy of Australia (3 gold, 2 silver, 1 bronze), J. Michael Plumb of the United States (2 gold, 4 silver) and Mark Todd of New Zealand (2 gold, 1 silver, 3 bronze) each have six eventing medals. Germany leads the all-time eventing medal table with 22 medals, 9 of them gold.

Wikipedia's list shows three riders who won the individual title more than once: Pahud de Mortanges on Marcroix (1928 and 1932), Mark Todd on Charisma (1984 and 1988), and Michael Jung on Sam (2012 and 2016) and Chipmunk FRH (2024). Julia Krajewski of Germany, on Amande de B'Neville at the Tokyo 2020 Games, is the first woman in that list of individual champions since 1912.

Jung added the 2026 world title at Aachen on fischerChipmunk FRH. British Equestrian notes it is his second individual world title, after 2010.

The Grand Slam

The Rolex Grand Slam of Eventing is won by taking Kentucky, Badminton and Burghley in a row. US Equestrian lists two winners: Pippa Funnell of Great Britain in 2003 (Kentucky and Burghley on Primmore's Pride, Badminton on Supreme Rock), the first to do it, and Michael Jung in 2015 to 2016 (Burghley 2015 and Badminton 2016 on La Biosthetique-Sam FBW, Kentucky 2016 on FischerRocana FST). We checked for later winners only against that page. The five-star events today are on eventing five-stars.

Other disciplines

In dressage, Charlotte Fry and Glamourdale won both individual titles at the 2026 World Championships, as they had at Herning in 2022 (British Dressage, 16 August 2026). In four-in-hand driving, the Aachen organiser reported on 23 August 2026 that Boyd Exell of Australia had won his eighth world title, which the FEI's release headline counted as eight in a row.

Pioneers told elsewhere

Lis Hartel, whose 1952 dressage silver Wikipedia describes as the first medal won by a woman in an individual Olympic event against men, and Pat Smythe are on equestrian sport at the Olympics. Federico Caprilli, who devised the forward seat, is on cavalry and the Olympic disciplines, and Alois Podhajsky and the Lipizzaner Neapolitano Nima I on the classical riding schools.

Keep reading

Disclosure The Gear Sports Equestrian is reader-supported. When you buy through links on our site, we may earn an affiliate commission at no extra cost to you. As an Amazon Associate we earn from qualifying purchases. Our recommendations are independent.