Thursday October 5, 2006

Martin Schaudt to Train Pati Pierucci at Hampton Green Farm in Wellington

German Olympian Martin Schaudt is planning to spend the winter in Wellington. A recent visit to Hampton Green Farm in Fruitport, Michigan, gave Schaudt the opportunity to finalize his plans to come to Florida later this year for the Winter Equestrian Festival season. Beginning in November, he will be spending several weeks a month at Hampton Green’s Wellington location in order to train Pati Pierucci and Hampton Green’s two Grand Prix Spanish stallions, Idilio and Cosaco, to prepare for the upcoming Sunshine Tour in March 2007.

While in Michigan, Schaudt selected one of the farm’s young horses, a five-year-old bay Spanish (PRE) stallion named Cuatrero, to train and show himself this winter in Wellington and to take back to Germany in the spring for training and competing. In addition, Schaudt has purchased for himself two 2006 PRE foals from Hampton Green Farm, from sires Idilio and Grandioso.

Martin Schaudt, consistently ranked among the world’s top dressage riders, rode for the German Gold in Athens on his Hanoverian gelding, Weltall. He has been interested in Spanish horses for several years. For a time, he trained the horse Minero from the Yeguada Maipe, who currently is showing in the small tour in Spain with Jose Ignacio Lopez Porras.

He was introduced last winter to Kimberly Van Kampen-Boyer, owner of Hampton Green Farms, and made several visits to the Wellington facility when he was in town for clinics. He was interested in rider Pati Pierucci’s work with her Grand Prix horses which led to discussions of his coming to Wellington and his visit to Michigan this past summer during the week of the WEG competition.