Diana Porsche Retires Di Sandro from Competition Sport

Dressage

Austria

Diana Porsche has decided to retire her career starting and medal winning Grand Prix horse Di Sandro from competition sport.

Di Sandro is an 18-year old Oldenburg gelding by De Niro out of Gentina (by Sandro x Grundstein x Waidmannsheil). He is bred by Afred Wilmhoff.

Uwe Schwanz

The bay gelding started his sport career in 2007 when he was a 4-year old under Anne Lauderbach. He then disappeared from the German show scene to return in 2013 under Uwe Schwanz at Prix St Georges level.

Schwanz campaigned Di Sandro at Grand Prix level through 2014, riding him for owner Sabrina Kirschner. The pair made its international debut at the 2014 CDI Donaueschingen, where he scored 67%. At the 2014 CDI-W Kaposvar they finished third in the big tour. At the CDI Munich Indoors last month they finished fourth in the GP (70.300%) and third in the Special (69.804%).

Sold to Porsche

In December 2014 the horse sold to the then German based Austrian junior rider Diana Porsche. Her trainer at the time, Dieter Laugks, had scouted the horse for her. At the time Porsche had been competing at international junior riders' level with Florencia (by Furst Heinrich x Ferman) and Eloy (by Earl x Wendenburg).

Kur bronze at the 2016 European U25 Championships

In 2015 Porsche made her Young Riders debut with Florencia and Eloy and her Under 25 Grand Prix debut on Di Sandro at the CDI Vidauban. That year they successfully competed in Roosendaal, Villach, Prangins, Lier, and Salzburg.

In 2016 the pair went full speed with numerous victories in Wellington, Florida, followed by a successful euro tour in Munich and Compiegne. Di Sandro offered her the high quality horse power and rideability that many other Under 25 riders did not. She travelled to the inaugural European Under 25 Championships as a medal favourite and returned hom with Kur bronze.

The building of her own stable "Gut Tannbrunn" near Salzburg, Austria, had finished and Diana moved permanently from Germany to Austria. She decided on a professional career in horses.

In 2017 Diana switched trainers to Leida Collins-Strijk and completed another successful show year in Wellington, Roosendaal, Rotterdam and Aachen, but then Di Sandro started to struggle with niggling injuries and was withdrawn from the 2017 European Under 25 Championships. After a year off, he returned in Aachen 2018.

In 2019 he did Wiener Neustadt, and Pilisjaszfalu to qualify for the 2019 European Under 25 Championships in San Giovanni, Italy, where they finished 6th in the Short Grand Prix and 11th in the Kur. In September 2019, the 16-year old Di Sandro won the Austrian Under 25 Championships for his rider.

Retirement

The 2019 Europeans turned out to be Di Sandro's last international shown, the 2019 Austrian Championships his last national competition.

In 2020 the corona pandemic removed any urgency to compete Di Sandro and Diana chose to focus on the younger horses in her barn. She rode the 2020 European Under 25 Championships with Douglas.

In July 2020, Diana told Eurodressage that Di Sandro is "not really retired. I wanted to focus this year more on my other horses because he did already so much for me and I for me it didn’t make sense to ride him more U25 tests. I wanted to show him some Grand Prix but corona came in between and all the shows I wanted to do with him were canceled. If there are some nice shows after the European champions I still want to show him, but in times like that you never know what’s happening and I think he also enjoys his easier work and more time on the fields."

Half a year later Diana explained to Eurodressage that she decided to fully retire him from competition sport. Di Sandro was the perfect schoolmaster for her and went above and beyond his duty.

"He did so much for me in the last years and I achieved everything I could dream of," Diana stated. "Now it’s time that I really focus on my younger horses and he’s still super happy and fit, so I’ll retired him. He’s now 18 and will stay forever at our stable Gut Tannbrunn and enjoy his deserved retirement on the fields."