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Langehanenberg wins Freestyle Deutsche Bank Prize

Jul 8, 2012

"I am overjoyed," a delighted Helen Langehanenberg said about her performance with Damon Hill in the Aachen Freestyle. The pair was awarded a score of 85.150 percent in the Deutsche Bank Prize, the Grand Prix Freestyle. "Our performance has improved here every day, I am super satisfied! There are a lot of top pairs at the moment. The respective form on the day is the decisive factor," commented Helen Langehanenberg, whose stud stallion, Damon Hill, a Westphalian-bred Donnerhall son, has already produced some very successful offspring.

Second place went to the winning pair of both Grand Prix and Grand Prix Special, Kristina Sprehe with the 11-year-old Hanoverian stallion Desperados. The pair scored 84.7 percent.
In all three tests Desperados and Damon Hill were really close to each other. While both pairs are impressive in their looks and manners, Desperados sometimes lacks a little activity from behind and regularity in the passage, where Damon Hill sometimes shows its temperament and over activity in the front with a slightly open mouth. The first is impressive by its collection while the latter specifically impresses by its extensions.

German riders ended at the first three placings. "Simply fantastic," was how Dorothee Schneider described her ride. "We are so much in harmony!" Her 10-year-old Hanoverian mare, Diva Royal, by Don Frederico (81.1 percent) probably now will develop to the best sport mare of the world.

Best Grand Prix pair and winner of the Grand Prix Dressage in Aachen now became Desperados and Kristina Sprehe after two wins and a second place, having a slight advancement over Helen Langehanenberg and Damon Hill NRW. So Sprehe and Desperados became the new winners, after last year's winners Matthias Rath and Totilas, the winners of 2010 Edward Gal and Totilas and 2009 American Steffen Peters and Ravel.

The Austrian rider, Victoria Max-Theurer, scored 80.975 percent, which placed her fourth in the rankings with Augustin OLD. Victoria Max-Theurer has been chosen as the best rider in München already. Now in Aachen she again was the best rider. Her list of wins was quite impressive.

Danish Nathalie zu Sayn Wittgenstein received a 9 for her new Freestyle music, especially newly created for the Olympic Games by Cees Slings, the musician who signed for the gold winning Freestyle of Anky van Grunsven and Bonfire at the WEG The Hague 1994 and the Olympic gold winning Freestyles of Anky van Grunsven in Sydney 2000 and Athens 2004. French Chansons was the theme of the newly made Freestyle for Nathalie zu Sayn Wittgenstein and Digby. 

Source Dressagedirect.com