European Championships in Aachen underway with Germany leading

The FEI Dressage European Championships Aachen 2015 is underway and the Germany are in the lead. The defending champions head the rankings with 150.100 points ahead of Netherlands who are on 148.214 points and Great Britain with 145.743 points.Isabell Werth on Don Johnson FRH (74.900) was top scorer with Patrick van der Meer on Uzzo (72.400) second. Aachen is Isabell Werth’s twelfth European Championships participation. The first time she competed at a European Championships was in 1989 with Weingart. Fiona Bigwood with Atterupgaards Orthilla were the strongest pair of the day for Great Britain. They were awarded a score of 75.800 percentage points, which meant they are lying just 0.014 percent behind the best rider of the day, the Dutch rider Silfhout. Aachen are also qualifiers for the Olympic Games. Three teams have already qualified for Rio de Janeiro next year: Germany, the Netherlands and Great Britiain, the three teams that are currently leading after the first day at the FEI European Championships Aachen 2015. Three further teams could also redeem their tickets here in Aachen. After the first half of the team classification, the teams from Sweden, Belgium and Spain rank fourth to sixth and would thus qualify for Olympia. But everything is still wide open, the teams from France and Denmark are close at their heels.Thursday, the second half of the Lambertz-Prize begins, the Grand Prix team classification. The strongest pairs will compete, including the reigning Olympic gold medallist and World Champion Charlotte Dujardin with Valegro for Great Britain, Kristina Bröring-Sprehe with Desperados and Matthias Alexander Rath with Totilas for Germany.