Michael Jung and Sam at Badminton. Photo by Jenni Autry.
La Biosthetique Sam FBW, Michael Jung’s gold medal Olympic partner at the 2012 London Olympics and the current reigning World and European champion, sustained an injury to his left hind leg at a mandatory German team outing at Warendorf last week, Fran Jurga reports. Consequently, he’s been withdrawn from the European Championships in Malmö, Sweden, next month and will also not be contesting Burghley in September.
From The Jurga Report:
Michael’s father, Joachim Jung, made the announcement for his son. A rough translation of his statement indicates that Sam did not perform well at the training session at Warendorf last week for the long-listed horses named to Germany’s European Championship team. “As it turned out, on closer examination, Sam has slightly injured the left hind leg and cannot be trained,” Jung said.
Sam is a 13-year-old Württemberg gelding. Jung and Sam have the glorious honor of being the reigning European, World and Olympic champions. They have all but dominated the sport for the past three years.
The German Federation further reported that it expects that Sam will also not be able to complete at the Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials (4*) in England in September.
“We obviously (don’t) want to take any chances,” Jung said. “Too bad, Sam was previously fantastic in training. “
It goes without saying that Sam is one of the best — if not the best — horses in the world right now, and it’s a huge blow to Michael to have his top horse out of contention at the European Championships. The good news is the injury doesn’t seem career-ending, and Michael is being smart by playing it safe. Michael will now defend his European Championship title on Halunke FBW, who won the Luhmühlen CIC3* earlier this year and most recently placed 10th in the Aachen CICO3*.
