Stuttgart – She celebrated her 24th birthday on Thursday and came third in the warm-up class. One day later on Friday morning, she comfortably won the “Piaff-Förderpreis” for the Prize of the Liselott-Schindling Stiftung – a foundation supporting dressage in Germany. For Franziska Stieglmaier, they were two successful and above all emotional days at the 32nd International STUTTGART GERMAN MASTERS Horse Show. Riding her 11-year old Bavaria gelding Lukas in the Hanns-Martin-Schleyer-Halle, she was awarded 69.760 percent points by the jury. She finished one place ahead of Juliette Piotrowski who was the runner-up for the second year in a row (68.620). The winner of the Piaff show in Balve in June was atop the Oldenburg gelding Sir Diamond in Stuttgart. “Just ride well, the rest will fall into place,” was the advice of Germany’s national dressage coach Monica Theodorescu and it is exactly what she did said the winner after her success. ”Lukas and I have worked our way up the ladder together – and now we’re on the next rung,” said a beaming Franziska Stieglmaier.
The national coach praised the young rider: “She is very concentrated and was faultless. Now she can be very proud as she has trained the horse right from when it was young.” Jürgen Koschel, the head coach of the group of up-and-coming riders called the Piaff-Förderpreis, “the springboard for an international career.”
