Theodora Livanos' Fido Dido Passed Away

Dressage

Greece

Greek Grand Prix rider Theodora Livanos had to say goodbye to her young riders horse Fido Dido last week. The KWPN gelding had to be put to sleep following a field accident.

Fido Dido was a 15-year old Dutch NRPS registered gelding by Florencio out of Nelinora (by Climax). He was bred by M.J. Ewals.

He was named after the mascot Fido Dido, which Pepsi cola created for the soft drink 7Up.

Petra van Esch

He was first competed as a youngster by Loes Spuls and finished third as a 4-year old in the 2010 Horsefood Dressage Talent competition in The Netherlands.

Petra van Esch took over the ride and brought the horse to Grand Prix level. In 2014 and 2015 they competed internationally at small tour level and finished 8th at the 2015 Dutch Small Tour Championships.

Fido Dido then started to appear at shows in Germany, where he had moved to to be sold. Van Esch had been competing him in Germany since 2011 but between March 2016 and May 2017 she particularly focused on introducing her horse to Grand Prix in Germany instead of Holland. Ursula Kufner first competed Fido Dido in an Intermediaire II class and then Van Esch tackled the Grand Prix classes with him.

Theodora Livanos

Van Esch and Fido Dido at the 2014 CDI Kapellen

In August 2017, Theodora Livanos acquired Fido Dido as a young riders' horse and second iron in the fire for youth sport alongside Winston.

Trained at the time by Birgit Wientzek-Plage, Livanos and Fido Dido made their international show debut at junior level at the CDI Le Mans, where they scored a hattrick, winning the team, individual and freestyle test. They moved straight up to Young Riders level and three months later competed at the CDI Compiegne and Aachen Dressage Days.

They represented Greece at the 2018 European Young Riders Championships in Fontainebleau, but had to retire from the individual test after a 39th place in the team test (67.676%).

Their last competition together was the CDI Le Mans in October 2018, where they returned to form and placed second twice in the team and freestyle test.

Total Rollercoaster

The bay gelding sustained an injury in the winter of 2018-2019 and a come back as a pair was not meant to be because of niggling injuries for both horse and rider.

In the summer of 2019, the Switzerland based Livanos moved to the U.K. to focus on her Grand Prix career on Robinvale and Dono di Maggio. Fido Dido stayed behind to recover and although the prognosis looked good, he re-injured himself.

Theo and Fido at the 2018 CDIO Compiegne

Livanos did not give up on bringing him back to fitness, but she dealt with a big blow herself at the beginning of 2020 when she was diagnosed with osteomyelitis and had to undergo complicated surgery to her leg in New York City that kept her out of the saddle for half a year.

Last week, Fido Dido had an accident in the field, while being turned out with his friends. He could not be saved.

"It's been a total rollercoaster," Livanos told Eurodressage, "quite an unlucky one as we didn’t really have our time. It was just always such unfortunate timing and injury. 2018 was basically my only real season with him. The Euros in 2018 were a nightmare. He was just so badly affected by the flies. It was horrible."

Although their sport partnership was short lived, Theodora looks back with gratitude on her time with Fido Dido.

"I feel beyond lucky to have had him in my life and in my journey," she said. "We achieved so many wonderful things together and it is beyond unfair that it had to end this soon as he had so much more to show everyone. He was a very special horse and I will miss him more than words can say."