Dania Mattaliano Moves to Bavaria

Tue, 03/19/2024 - 10:17
Germany
Dania Mattaliano on Russian Olympic team horse Balagur at Monica Thedorescu's yard near Warendorf :: Photo © Silke Rottermann

Italian Dania Mattaliano is a long-time professional rider for Monica Theodorescu and she has now accepted a job at the Yara Reichert's yard in Bavaria, south of Germany.

The 35-year old Dania Mattaliano is from Milan (ITA) and studied at the University of Parma but has pursued a professional career in horse sport. 

In Italy she worked as a rider at Scuderia Della Malaspina in Ornago as well as for Centro Ippico Rivoltelle before moving north. She worked for Adelinde Cornelisen for 10 months in 2014. In 2015 she settled with Monica Theodorescu and has been her steady wingman since then. 

"I've been looking for a long time for someone who thinks like me, that kindness is as important as discipline when we talk about horses and who could show me the right way to make my thoughts also become my actions," Dania told Eurodressage. "I found this someone in Monica! I loved working for her so much because the focus of the work has always been the welfare of horses and the classical riding."

At Theodorescu's she became the principle care-giver for Aleksandra Korelova's Balagur who spent his retirement there as well as rode horses professionally. She learnt from Monica's team horse Whisper.

Most recently Dania was also riding for Hof Borgmann.  Dania competed mainly in Germany, her CDI debut was in 2022 at the CDI Neu-Anspach where she showed two 5-year olds, Filandro and Fanciulla Danzante.

Mattaliano has now decided to take up a riding job at Reichert's yard in south Germany as of 1 April 2024.

"My plan was to stay a year or two (with Monica) and then return to Italy or at least get closer to my family. instead I got along so well with Monica that I decided to stay. Just like the blink of an eye, 9 years have passed," said Dania. "The desire to get closer to my family has never gone away, the desire for new inputs and my self-confidence has increased and incidentally Monica, given her many work commitments, has decided not to take on any new clients to focus more on her job as a trainer which is very time consuming. Thus came my decision to try to move to the south of Germany."

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