The Netherlands’ Olympic medal-winning dressage rider Arjen Teeuwissen has died, aged 53.
The Dutch national federation KNHS confirmed that Arjen passed away suddenly on 29 March. He lived in the Netherlands until 1998, then moved to Belgium.
Arjen Teeuwissen was a former Dutch champion, and in 1999 he and KWPN gelding Goliath T were part of the silver medal-winning team at the European Dressage Championships, on home soil in Arnhem. The team of Arjen and Goliath, Anky van Grunsven and Bonfire, Ellen Bontje and Silvano and Coby van Baalen and Ferro, were second to Germany, while Denmark took bronze. Arjen and Goliath won individual bronze.
The following year Arjen and Goliath were third at the World Cup Final in Den Bosch, the Netherlands, and the pair went on to compete at the Sydney Olympic Games, Australia, where they won team silver. In 2001 they won team and individual silver at the Europeans in Verden, Germany.
The 2003 Europeans at Hickstead was Arjen’s last international competition with Goliath, who later sustained an injury and then retired. Arjen continued to train and compete nationally for a number of years, and returned to the international arena for one competition in 2013, the Kapellen CDI3*, in Belgium, with Silver ‘n’ Brass.
In an interview with CHIO Rotterdam in 2022, Arjen said he was no longer active in sport and that all his horses had been sold, adding that he was supporting his husband Frank in the catering industry.
A spokesman for KNHS said the organisation “wishes Arjen’s relatives a lot of strength with this enormous loss”.
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