With the upcoming retirement of Adelinde Cornelissen's Parzival, Austrian transport entrepreneur Herbert Jerich has announced he will no longer be sponsoring the Dutch Olympic rider.
At the 2009 European Dressage Championships in Windsor Jerich came to the rescue when Parzival's co-owner Henk Koers announced he wanted to sell his share in the horse. Jerich financially supported Cornelissen so she could obtain full ownership of Parzival.
"Herbert Jerich's sponsorship contributed partly to the fact that I was able to keep Parzival," said Cornelissen. "Throughout the years a good friendship grew between me and Herbert and he will continue to be involved in my barn in the background."
The connection between Jerich and Cornelissen was made at the time by Camil Smeulders and John van de Laar.
"I was looking for a good rider for me and my wife's dressage horses and the two told me I had to get Adelinde," said Jerich. "I contacted here and eight days later she was here in Austria. Afterwards we signed a sponsorship contract for four years." He later added three more years to that contract.
Cornelissen briefly competed the Jerich owned Wunschtraum and also had Dante Delux in her barn. At the moment Adelinde still has Herbert's 5-year old KWPN stallion Goodman (by Jazz x Lancet x Ulft) in training.
The Olympic Games were meant to be Parzival's finals competition, but after retiring in the Grand Prix it was not the swan song envisaged. Cornelissen is still unsure how, when and if she will be doing a special retirement ceremony for the horse.
"I'm riding Parzival at home and do my rounds in the woods. Parzival never liked laps of honour, so I don't want to make him go through that. But such a horse deserves a proper goodbye. I'm still thinking about how I'm going to do that."
Photo © Astrid Appels
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