Hannah Biggs' Weltzin Passed Away

Dressage

Great Britain

Hannah Biggs’ career making Grand Prix horse Weltzin has passed away on 7 November 2023. He was 24 years old.

Weltzin was a Hanoverian bred stallion by Weltbogen out of Werthvoll FRH (by Werther x Vollkorn xx x Gotthard). He was bred by Eberhard von Lewinski.

Premium Stallion

The chestnut was named a premium stallion at the 2001 Hanoverian Stallion Licensing in Verden.

He did his 300-day stallion performance test in Adelheidsdorf in 2002 and scored 100,10 points for dressage (20th) and 86,80 for show jumping (33rd) totalling 92,18 points which placed him 30th in a group of 50 (!!) participating stallions.

He has no offspring registered in Germany. He was first competed in Germany as a 5-year old by Christian Reisch in the summer of 2003.

Hannah Biggs

Weltzin sold to Biggs later in 2003 when the horse was 5. She trained him up the levels herself.

The duo has represented Great Britain at the CDIO Rotterdam, Hagen and Aachen. They competed at the World Cup qualifiers in Amsterdam and London. Their career highlights were most likely a second place in the Grand Prix Special at the 2013 CDI 4* Hamburg Dressage Derby and a victory in the Grand Prix Kur at the 2014 CDI 3* in Saumur.

At the end of Weltzin's sport career Biggs initially planned to loan him to a young rider as a schoolmaster, but an injury sustained in the field interrupted that plan.

Retired as the King of the Yard

In the winter of 2015-2016 a rising 18-year old Weltzin was fully retired from sport and enjoyed a long retirement in the field.

“He was still the king of the yard and always passaged down to the stables, announcing his arrival and keeping everyone on their toes," Biggs told Horse & Hound.

The chestnut was loved and cared for till his last day.

The parting photo of Weltzin Hannah shared

"He had a lovely (last) day, a warm bath, lots of pampering, a walk up the road, just me and him spending some quality time together," said Hannah. “Then I let him loose in the school, he had a roll, a canter around and at first wouldn’t let me catch him! Then we did some more piaffe for fun and then rested and I fed him his favourite treat of bananas until the vet arrived. His spirit was always so strong, so stoic and I knew he would fight for me until the end. It was the hardest decision in the world, he was my best friend and I trusted him with everything I had. But in the end, I had to make the decision for him and as his body started to fade, I couldn’t ask him to weather another winter."

Biggs continued her international show career with Camarilla Calimero and Don Caledonia. Her last international show was five years ago, at the 2018 CDI Hickstead. At national level she is currently competed the 9-year old Hanoverian Dutch Habour H (by Destano x Stedinger) at Prix St Georges level alongside younger horses St Giles Fortune Cookie (by Foundation x Sandro Hit) and D'Isneys Fantasia SFS (by D'Egalité x Fidertanz).