Valegro
British world champion dressage horse (2002-2025)
| Olympic medal record | ||
|---|---|---|
| Equestrian | ||
| 2012 London | Team dressage | |
| 2012 London | Individual dressage | |
| 2016 Rio de Janeiro | Individual dressage | |
| 2016 Rio de Janeiro | Team dressage | |
Valegro (5 July 2002, 1 December 2025) was a gelding ridden by the British equestrian Charlotte Dujardin in the sport of dressage. He stood 16.2 hands (66 inches, 168 cm) and had the stable name of Blueberry. He was a double World Champion in Dressage, he won Grand Prix Special and Grand Prix Freestyle at the World.
01Career
Having joined Carl Hester's stable in Newent, Gloucestershire as a groom, Dujardin was offered the opportunity to develop the novice Dutch Warmblood gelding by Hester and co-owner Roly Luard, with the later intention of the horse being ridden in competition by Hester.
Valegro remained unbeaten since CDI Kapellen in January 2012.
The combination became part of the team which won gold in a European Dressage Championships event in Rotterdam. They then won the FEI World Cup grand prix at London Olympia in 2011, setting a world record for the Olympic grand prix special discipline scoring 88.022%, in April 2012.
Selected to represent Great Britain in the 2012 Summer Olympics, in the first round they set a new Olympic record of 83.784%. On 7 August 2012 the pair were members of the team which won the gold medal in the team dressage event. Two days later they won the gold in the individual dressage event with a score of 90.089%.
At the 2013 European Championships in Herning, Charlotte and Valegro won both the Grand Prix and the Grand Prix Special with 85.94% and 85.69%.
At Olympia 2013 he beat the Grand Prix Freestyle world record (by around 2%) he set the new record to 93.975% (the record was previously held by Edward Gal and Moorlands Totilas). At Olympia 2014 he improved his own Grand Prix Freestyle world record (94.3%) and his own Grand Prix world record (87.46%).
Valegro also achieved a gold medal in the individual dressage at the Rio de Janeiro 2016 Summer Olympics with a score of 93.857%, and was an integral part of the Silver medal winning Team for Great Britain, at the same event. In 2016 Breyer released a model of Valegro.
02Retirement
On 14 December 2016, Valegro and Charlotte Dujardin marked his retirement from competition with a performance given at the London International Horse Show 2016 and televised live by the BBC. It was followed by a farewell ceremony with Valegro's owners, and companions Charlotte Dujardin, Carl Hester and Alan Davies.
03Death
Valegro died on 1 December 2025, at the age of 23. The death was announced alongside that of Uthopia. Both died by euthanasia.
04Breeding
Valegro was sired by the legendary KWPN stallion Negro, by Olympic Ferro.
Sources and credits
This article is adapted from the Wikipedia article “Valegro”, written by its contributors and licensed under CC BY-SA 4.0. Fathomly has changed the layout, removed citation markers, navigation and maintenance notices, and adjusted punctuation. This adapted version is shared under the same license. For references, see the original article.
Images, from Wikimedia Commons:
- Charlotte Dujardin 2012 Olympic Dressage-1.JPG by Charlotte_Dujardin_2012_Olympic_Dressage.JPG: Equestrian derivative work: Nordlicht8, CC BY-SA 3.0
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