Damon Hill, dark chestnut Westphalian  Stallion, by (Donnerhall / Rubinstein I) born in 2000, standing approximately 16.1 hands.

Damon Hill was a premium stallion and performance test winner in 2002. He received high marks at the Bundeschampionate in 2003 in Warendorf. In 2005 Damon Hill won the qualifying round and the World Championship for young dressage horses. His scores were: walk 9.2, trot 9.80, and canter 9.2. Damon Hill prolonged his reign in 2006 when he lived up to all expectations. The stunning stallion with power and balance captured the 2006 World Breeding Championship for young dressage horses in Verden Germany again with scores in the 9.0’s.

At the age of 12, the remarkable Westphalian stallion, Damon Hill FRH is taking the world by storm. With a record breaking win in Balve, Germany at the German National Championships, Damon Hill FRH and Helen Langehanenberg have established themselves as the new leaders in German dressage. The pair took home two golds from Balve scoring a remarkable 88.400% in the Kur, and were named to the Olympic German Team. In London, they brought home team silver, and placed 4th being only .03% away from the individual bronze medal!

Damon Hill was a premium stallion and performance test winner in 2002. Early in his career, he received high marks at the Bundeschampionate in 2003, was the bronze medalist at the 2004 Bundeschampionate, and in 2005 Damon Hill won the World Championship for the 5 year old Dressage Horses under Helen Langehanenberg who took over riding him from an injured Ingrid Klimke. His scores were: walk 9.2, trot 9.80, and canter 9.2. Damon Hill prolonged his reign in 2006 when he lived up to all expectations back under Ingrid herself. The stunning stallion with power and balance captured the 2006 World Breeding Championship for young dressage horses in Verden Germany again with scores in the 9.0?s. With his excellent character and great impression he wins the hearts of everyone he meets. Along with his "day job" as a Grand Prix dressage horse, he is also a breeding stallion in high demand. He captivates through his extraordinary ability, and convinces with his work ethic and desire to please.

Dami enjoys the days when he can do his dressage training outdoors on the hills and has a lot of fun with the gymnastic jumping. Ingrind Klimke commented that it has given her great pleasure to train such a talented horse. At the age of seven, he often won S-Dressage competitions and at eight years old, he finished second in the Nürnberger Burg-Pokal. At nine, he won many Grand Prix tests and was second at the Medien Cup Final in Munster at the Turnier der Sieger.

Damon Hill has lived up to all expectations, showing a lot of amplitude, power and balance, not to mention his ability to produce exceptional offspring such as the approved stallion and silver medalists of the 2011 World Championships for the 6 year old Dressage Horses, Damon Jerome H who also recently won the 2012 Nürnberger Burg-Pokal qualifier in Mannheim under Uta Gräf. In addition to Damon Jerome H, Damon Hill was also the sire of the 2008 Westphalian Elite Mare show, Deprice (mv Frühlingsball), and he has sired many foals who have qualified for the Westphalian and German Foal Championships. One of the outstanding ones was the 2005 Reserve Westphalian Champion filly out of a Riokio mare. Damon Hill also sired the Champion RPSI colt, Cavalier.

By KENNETH J. BRADDICK 

GOTHENBURG, Sweden, April 27 Helen Langehanenberg became the World Cup champion Saturday when she rode her German team Olympic mount Damon Hill NRW to victory while two-time champions Adelinde Cornelissen and Jerich Parzival were runnerup to miss becoming only the second rider to win three straight titles.

Helen's Freestyle ride that she said was the best ever on Damon Hill and confirmed by the score that was a personal best of 88.286 per cent while Adelinde admitted she and her 16-year-old KWPN gelding were still not used to her new music and scored 86.214 per cent. Fellow Dutch rider Edward Gal and Glock?s Undercover were third with 84.446 percent.

 The Scandinavium Center's near capacity crowd of 12,000 spectators appeared by the applause to agree with the order of finish though there were questions to Gustav Svalling of Sweden, president of the ground jury, about a difference of more than 11 per cent between the hghest and lowest scores for Adelinde and Parzival.

The quality of the competition was extraordinarily high with five combinations scoring above 80 per cent in the only annual global championship of dressage and that is in its 28th year.

 And the tension increased as the last five of the 17 starting combinations began the countdown to the final pair, Adelinde and Parzival who had won this title in 2011 and 2012 and were riding to become only the second pair to win three straight championships. Only Anky Van Grunsven has performed that feat and she did it twice in amassing a total of nine World Cups.

Helen Langehanenberg celebrating with a victory gallop on Damon Hill NRW. © 2013

Ken Braddick/dressage-news.com

The pint-sized Helen Langehanenberg-she gives her height as 163cm (5 ft. 3 1/2 ins.)-dashed those hopes. She was runner-up in the World Cup in s-Hertogenbosch, the Netherlands last year, but after winning the opening Grand Prix Thursday made it clear she would be the one to beat in the Freestyle which is the only score that counts.

"?I had a very great feeling, it was just a dream," she said. "Wow!"

"He was brilliant to ride. He gave me so much confidence."

"He told me during the test, 'don't do too much. I know what to do.'"

 Damon Hill, a 13-year-old Westfalen stallion (Donnerhall x Romanze x Rubinstein I) was right, knew exactly what to do and won marks of 10 for some movements.

Helen took over the ride on Damon Hill in 2010 after Ingred Klimke had trained the horse to Grand Prix, winning the six-year-old title at the World Young Horse Championships in Verden, Germany along the way. Helen rode the stallion on the German team at the European Championships in 2011 and the Olympics in London last summer.

Germany has won the World Cup eight times, the last being Isabell Werth on Warum Nicht at Las Vegas in 2007.

She hopes to make the team for the Europeans in Denmark later this year. She works once a week with Klaus Balkenhol, German Olympic gold medalist and coach of the United States team for eight years.

She said Damon Hill is more settled and more powerful.

"I always have the feeling it is perfect then he tops it again," she said. "He's something special-he can read and write.'

 Adelinde joked that her ride was "a lot better than Thursday, no spooking, no breaking out," referring to spinning twice in the transition from piaffe to passage on the centerline in the Grand Prix