The Global Champions League's "midseason transfers" have been announced and involve three German show jumpers
2026 Global Champions League – Auffarth and Schulze Topphoff In, Meyer-Zimmermann Out
from Dominique Wehrmann 
The 11-year-old Comcador OLD is not only Sandra Auffarth’s second option for top-level competition alongside her World Cup horse Quirici H, but also another breeding flagship for the family.
Photo: sportfotos-lafrentz.de The Global Champions League’s “midseason transfers” have been finalized. After Janne Friederike Meyer-Zimmermann announced that she disagreed with the team’s approach to horse management and was therefore no longer an “Iron Dames” rider, it was clear that the Cannes Stars would have to look for a replacement for the Aachen champion, team World and European champion. They found her in the form of French rider Ines Joly.
Sandra Auffarth Joins the GCL Business
Sandra Auffarth will replace Italian rider Lorenzo de Luca at Valkenswaard United. For the former two-time world champion in eventing, who has not competed in international eventing since the Paris Olympics—where she was originally supposed to compete with Viamant du Matz, her European Championship bronze medalist— has not competed internationally in eventing (only in a Level L cross-country competition at home in Ganderkesee), this will mark her debut in the Global Champions League and an important step offering her the chance to earn world ranking points and further establish herself in the world of show jumping.
She now rides alongside Marcus Ehning and Hans-Dieter Dreher, European team champion Gilles Thomas (BEL) and his compatriot Thibault Philippaerts, a talented U25 rider, as well as Edwina Tops-Alexander, the wife of the man who started it all, Jan Tops.
Philipp Schulze Topphoff on the team
With a spectacular comeback—thanks to victories in the last three stages —Riesenbeck International had taken the lead in the league’s overall standings. Nevertheless, there is a change in the Winning Team, which for the rest of the season will consist primarily of current and former Beerbaum Stables riders. Philipp Schulze-Topphoff, who joined Beerbaum Stables in April, is replacing the Italian Emanuele Camilli.
In addition to Schulze Topphoff, the team now includes Christian Kukuk, brothers Maximilian and Philipp Weishaupt, Marco Kutscher, and Ciaran Nallon from Ireland.
