European Dressage Championships Move to Hagen, Germany

Following the decision to withdraw the 2005 FEI European Dressage Championships from Moscow (RUS) several NFs offered to provide a host for the event.

During the discussions over the last weekend the GER NF and the organiser of Hagen, Mr Ulli Kasselmann and Paul Schockemöhle, offered to stage the championship on the same weekend as the cancelled event (26-31 July). This will enable the riders to maintain their training schedule, cause minimum disruption to the FEI Calendar and will ensure that the TV schedules are not interrupted.

The FEI is very pleased to accept this offer and has allocated the FEI European Dressage Championship 2005 to Hagen.

Following the change of the presidency at the Russian Equestrian Federation, the venue and the Organising Committee (OC) of the 2005 FEI Dressage Championship due to take place from 26 to 31 July 2005 was changed to Bitsa several weeks ago.

The OC had a number of problems raising the finances to organise the Championship. The FEI received letters from the Government of the Region and of the City of Moscow giving assurance of their support to the championship but no concrete financial guarantee was received.

Unfortunately these guarantees were not received and the FEI withdrew the Championship from Moscow.