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The most expensive dressage horse in the world
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The marvelous stallion Totilas dies – a lost race
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Alexander Rath on Totilas.
Photo: AP / Martin Meissner
Suburb Totilas passed away on Monday night. Once celebrated as a miracle stallion, the world’s most expensive horse no longer lived up to expectations after moving to Germany.
Totilas is dead The wonderful stallion, who disengaged from dressage early in his career and later withered, was 20 years old. The exceptional horse succumbed to colic on Monday night. “It happened last night, but we took the time to process it today,” his pilot Matthias Rath told Eurodressage magazine on Tuesday, “he had an operation and even got up again, but he didn’t make it. Super fit.”
Totilas once swept the scene like a hurricane. When the majestic black horse entered the plaza, the audience held their breath in fascination. Time stopped at this moment. And when Totilas then drew his magic in the sand, especially with his inimitable piafas, it gave goose bumps in the world of dressage.
Under Edward Gal’s saddle, Gribaldi’s son broke all records at the 2009 European Championships, he became THE theme of equestrian sport. Totilas was the first horse to receive more than 90 percentage points for a Grand Prix Freestyle. In December he set the record at 92.30 percent. Only the sky seemed to be her limit. The duo led the Dutch team to team gold at the following year’s World Cup in Kentucky and also triumphed in singles.
But they were the last glorious moments in Totilas’s life. Disdainful Mammon put an end to the singular high flight. Totilas changed hands in October 2010. Paul Schockemöhle brought the black horse to Germany for around ten million euros. This was to ensure German supremacy in dressage for years.
This plan completely failed. Matthias Alexander Rath, the stepson of co-owner Ann-Kathrin Linsenhoff, was chosen as the pilot. Questions quickly arose as to whether he was the right person for the job. And they were confirmed. A silver medal at the 2011 European Championships in Rotterdam and a team bronze once in 2015 in Aachen was the former wonder horse’s modest sporting record. It was the last big sports appearance.
After the Nations Cup, the bone edema in the left hind leg initially meant the end of the Eurocup and five days later the end of his career. The management of the German team was attacked after there were indications that Totilas had been sent to the square with an injury. The four-legged friend is said to have passed the test painfully to secure German gold. But instead of gold, in the end only bronze remained.
After the end of his career, Totilas was supposed to launder money in his owners’ coffers as a stallion. After the interest was initially very high, it stabilized remarkably over the years. However, Paul Schockemöhle came to a satisfied conclusion: “In general, I know he has inherited well. And I think he has very special bloodlines,” said Europe’s largest horse dealer.
But Totilas was destined for something else, for magic in a square. But life had a different plan.
