Veteran athlete Rebecca Hart has been selected to represent the U.S. Para Dressage Team at the FEI Para Dressage World Championships, happening Aug. 18-23 in Aachen, Germany, aboard Rowan O’Riley’s Floratina, an 18-year-old Hanoverian mare (Fidertanz 2 x Rubina, by Rubin Royal OLD) with whom Hart won three gold medals—individual, team and freestyle—at the 2024 Paris Paralympics. 

We caught up with Hart to learn more about what it means to be competing on the hallowed grounds of Aachen, and doing it with the horse who made her a Paralympic champion.

My introduction to the magic of Aachen came almost a decade ago, when I traveled to Germany with my longtime friend and sponsor Rowan O’Riley near the beginning of our relationship. We were shopping for the first horse she owned for me to compete—El Corona Texel, the horse with whom I earned the first World Equestrian Games medals for the United States (bronze and silver in 2018), my first Paralympic medal in Tokyo (team bronze in 2021), and whom I’m still riding and loving today—and CHIO Aachen was happening.

We hadn’t planned or expected to see the competition at all, but our friend Fernando Ortega was grooming for the German team and was able to get us tickets to watch the dressage final. 

I had the most completely unplanned, but absolutely most magical, experience as a spectator ever—coincidentally on the very same day that we found “Tex,” which made it even more special. I remember the closing of the competition, where everyone was given white handkerchiefs to wave and sing a song, while all the athletes paraded around the arena. It was a phenomenal shared experience that I’ve had at like other sporting events, like soccer, but I’d never really seen or experienced that energy in an equestrian competition. That really stuck with me.

Fast forward to 2021, and Aachen was where the horses staged before shipping to Tokyo for the Paralympics. I was able to ride Tex in the Aachen stadium during that time, and that in itself was a magical experience.

It does feel there is a weight to that venue: You want to live up to the name and the history of Aachen, and to be able to put your footprints in those historic arenas where years and years of greats have come before you, and hopefully, you can add to the legacy and add to the history with your performance and the dedication of your team that is completely behind you. So there is a specialness to it.

I honestly never imagined getting to actually compete in Aachen. I always wanted to put my footsteps in that sand, and I thought doing that with Tex was kind of my way to do it. 

So it’s kind of wild, now, to be headed there with my Paris Paralympic partner Floratina. 

‘It Wasn’t Supposed to Happen’

I usually start preparing about two years before a large championship, thinking about what qualifiers I need to be doing, what that process leading up to it is going to be, and also what horses I’m going to aim for it.

Originally, Paris was going to be my last big show with “Flora,” because that was when my lease with her was over. We have two other horses—Remedy, a 6-year-old Danish Warmblood who has been living in England with British Olympic dressage rider Fiona Bigwood; and Liberation, a more experienced 10-year-old Hanoverian we bought in the United States earlier this year—we initially were considering as candidates for this championship.

Both could be strong contenders for the LA28 Paralympics, but it ended up being such an amazing experience and partnership with Flora that Rowan, who is insanely kind and generous, decided to purchase her late last year so we could keep that partnership alive and together. So this championship actually feels even more special, just because it wasn’t supposed to happen like this, and we’re here.

Liberation, or “Luke,” has been named as my direct reserve horse, should anything happen to Flora. It’s a real credit to him to get that nod, considering he came into the picture in April and has had a bit of a crash course in para. I’ve really gotten to know him over this summer and helped him understand the aids and cues I use instead of leg aids. He was immediately nicknamed “the snugglebug” because he’s the most chill horse in the stable, and he just loves people and wants you to snuggle his face.

He’s the same in the arena—although he definitely has an engine despite his chill personality. He’s quite an interesting horse for the future; he just needs to develop some muscle and learn to connect from behind without having the support of an able-bodied leg.

As for Flora, at 18 and with the Paralympics and Pan American Games (in 2019, with Canadian rider Lindsay Kellock Duckworth) already on her resumé, she is a queen and an utter professional. My responsibility is to keep her healthy and comfortable. She doesn’t have to train movements, because at her seasoned age, she knows exactly what she’s doing, and she really enjoys going out in the ring. 

It’s just a joy to compete with her, because you can take her anywhere, and she is just the most consistent, wonderful creature. So, her campaign did not have to be excessive; she only did one CPEDI3* this year, in July in Hagen, Germany, to show she hasn’t forgotten anything. When you do have an older horse, you have to be tactful and aware of the miles that you’re putting on in the arena, and also the miles that you’re putting on the road.

Springtime Overseas

We knew that our best bet was to come over to the United Kingdom, and then she wouldn’t have to do a ton of road miles in the U.S. or multiple flights back and forth. To be strategic about our timeline and geography, we decided to leave Wellington, Florida, in April and relocate to the United Kingdom to work with Fiona Bigwood at Brantridge Park Stud in Balcombe, West Sussex.

Fiona already had my young horse, Remedy, and her facility is beautiful, with lots of great turnout and hacking.

With Flora, in order to keep her muscle strong enough without pounding on her, she does a lot of work in the walk. That usually means, in addition to plenty of turnout and time on the walker, about three days a week of work in the ring, incorporating things like elevated poles that are low on concussion but big on strength-building. She also does lots of hacking, which Fiona’s place is perfect for.

I think the proprioception involved in walking on uneven surfaces is really important, even in dressage, where our ring surface is so manicured all of the time. I don’t know if that comes from my earlier career when I was jumping and eventing, that I really believe that horses need to train on different surfaces. I think it helps build strength and develop their bones and their ligaments, and it also just helps their balance and their awareness. So she does lots of hacking, and she loves this beautiful countryside in the U.K. She likes to get out of the arena, and she likes to go explore, so we either start with that or we end with that pretty much every single day, and sometimes we only do that. 

I have to be just as strategic with my own physical fitness routine to be in peak fitness, and like Flora, I try to avoid concussion in that process. My condition, familial spastic paraplegia, is a progressive condition, which means that if I let my own physicality slip, it’s harder for me to build back the muscle that I have lost. That means I’ve found it’s easiest to try to maintain my fitness—but like any human, that was considerably easier at 20 than it is now at 40! I enjoy swimming as a way to keep myself fit off of the horses, but I am also blessed to be in a situation currently where I can ride multiple horses a day, so that’s also a big part of my fitness.

On the competition side, we elected to only do the Hagen (Germany) CPEDI3* in July, not just because I want to be strategic about the timing and fitness with an older horse, but also because Flora is incredibly confident in the arena and does better when she does less. I really save the number of centerlines I do with her, so Hagen was our choice to come out because of her history and her track record. 

She was able to do that competition and still be selected for the team, which was excellent. I didn’t want to leave her in Germany after that show, though, because we have an excellent base in the U.K. with an incredible team that helps us get ready. So, we went back to Fiona’s for about a month and then came back for training camp, which I always enjoy because it’s a nice, protective space to then get ready for a big championship.

The Final Stretch

The members of our team (fellow Paris Paralympians Kate Shoemaker and Fiona Howard, along with Marie Vonderheyden) have been training in different places, but on Aug. 9 we all arrived in Hagen, Germany, for our final training camp with chef d’equipe Michel Assouline. We’ll be here until we move onto the Aachen show grounds on Aug. 16, and competition starts for us on Aug. 18.

The team that was selected is very similar to the one we had in Paris, and I think having that shared experience, camaraderie and understanding of each other can only benefit us in such a pressure-cooker situation as these world championships. I’d love to experience that Paris magic together again, but I’m realistic that it’s a big ask. 

Horses can be incredibly humbling, and they don’t really care about the results that you expect in the ring, or the results that you have achieved in the ring previously. So for me, it is my own mentality, my own thoughts, that I have to control as we head into this championship. I’ve been doing this a long time, and while Paris was my most successful trip, I try to give every bit of dedication and effort that I can to every performance.

Especially with Flora, we know each other so well now. I just want to give her a good trip and hopefully stand on the podium.

There will be a lot of younger, very talented horses in Aachen, but the queen and I are game to fight them for a podium position.

For More:

See more FEI World Championships Aachen 2026 coverage here.

View the event website here.

About Rebecca Hart

Rebecca Hart is a five-time Paralympian who earned three gold medals—one team and two individual—at the 2024 Paris Games with Floratina and team bronze at the 2021 Tokyo Games with El Corona Texel. She also won team and individual bronze at the 2022 FEI Para Dressage World Championships (Denmark) with El Corona Texel. Learn more about her here.