Sophie Hinners

On May 1, 2008, a youth tournament was held in Sittensen. One of the participants was an eleven-year-old girl called Sophie Hinners. Riding her pony Fit For Fun TCF, she took part in two novice class pony jumping competitions. Sophie was not placed, neither in the style jumping nor against the clock. The unspectacular start to a career in the saddle, which could be entitled: “Go with the Flow”. Because Sophie Hinners didn’t actually want to become a show jumper or professional rider. Circumstances led her in this direction and today she is one of the best show jumpers in the world.

Born in 1997, Sophie Hinners was already in the saddle at the age of four. It all began at her aunt and uncle’s farm and with her cousin Lennert Hauschild. She won her first ribbons in the dressage arena and actually felt at home here. But as she was always given jumping ponies to ride, she was denied the higher ranks of dressage. So she moved on to show jumping.

It was also not initially planned that riding would become her profession. Sophie wanted to become a vet. But as a realist, she realized that the life of a vet would be difficult to reconcile with intensive competition riding, as she once explained in an interview with spring-reiter.de. But she still wanted to study. But which one? Sophie didn’t know. To avoid wasting a year, she decided to do an apprenticeship at Hergen Forkert’s show jumping stable. One day in 2018, the former Dutch Olympic rider and horse dealer Emile Hendrix came to the yard to look at a horse. Sophie rode it in front of him. Hendrix wasn’t interested in the horse, but he was interested in the rider. This was Hinners’ big chance, and she seized it.

Darling Vittorio

Among the horses that Hinners got to ride at Stall Hendrix was the Hanoverian gelding Vittorio, who had previously competed successfully with world-class riders such as Max Kühner and most recently Ian Millar. Sophie and Vittorio “matched”. Shortly after getting to know each other, they picked up their first ribbons in Grand Prix competitions, initially at two-star and 1.45 meter level. But things quickly got higher and more important. The pair had their breakthrough in 2021. First they became German champions in Balve, followed by their first Nations Cup nomination. At the semi-finals of the EEF series in Budapest, they contributed two clear rounds to the German victory, also came third in the World Cup jumping competition and then competed for Germany at the EEF Nations’ Cup Final in Warsaw. And they were nominated for the CHIO Aachen, which had been moved to September 2021 due to the postponement caused by the coronavirus pandemic. It was the first five-star tournament for the pair. They qualified for the Grand Prix straight away. Since then, Vittorio has had competition among Hinners’ ridden horses, but emotionally he is and will probably remain number one.

First time in a red jacket with Million Dollar

But Hinners has long since stopped riding in Emile Hendrix’s stable. In spring 2021, she joined VW Equestrian, the company behind her partner Richard Vogel and David Will. She was allowed to take Vittorio with her. But she also got plenty of other horses to ride. With her sensitive nature, she was initially a safe bet when it came to young horse competitions. But her talent, diligence and ambition caught the eye. The Holsteiner Verband entrusted her with one of its most important stallions, Million Dollar. The Plot Blue son, bred in Belgium, was first presented by Ebba Johansson (SWE) and then by Frank Schuttert (NED), but without any notable results. This changed when Hinners took over the stallion at the age of ten. They finished second in their very first Grand Prix – still at two-star level. And so it went on. They collected ribbon after ribbon and were finally nominated for the EEF Nations’ Cup in Mannheim in May, where they contributed to second place in front of their home crowd with two clear rounds. They were also the ones who went into the jump-off for Germany, but were just under a second slower than the competition from Switzerland in the shape of Alain Jufer on Dante MM. The next big event was the semi-final of the EEF Nations Cup in Budapest. Here it worked out with the victory. It was Million Dollar’s last tournament. He had to have an operation due to a hernia. He did not return to the sport after that.

The breakthrough

However, the loss of the stallion could not stop Sophie Hinners. Her career list was full of talented young horses that she carefully built up, such as the now nine-year-old mare Kaleni Jo, who she brought into the sport via the Youngster Tour. Or her shooting star Singclair. This Swedish gelding, whose name brings any autocorrect to its knees, was initially ridden by Peder Fredricson’s rider Stephanie Holmén, and briefly also by Fredricson himself. Sophie Hinners then took over the reins in November. Success was not long in coming. They came second at their third competition together, the World Cup show jumping competition in Abu Dhabi. The following week, they came second in Al Ain and then won the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix, followed by two clear rounds in the Sharjah Nations Cup. It didn’t stop there. They jumped from success to success, including sixth in the Prize of Europe at the CHIO Aachen 2025 and eleventh in the Grand Prix. They also jumped double clear in the Nations’ Cup at Spruce Meadows and were recently part of the third-placed team in the FEI League of Nations Final in Barcelona.

Both Kaleni Jo and Singclair now have an additional name: Iron Dames. It is the name of the Global Champions League team that Frenchwoman Deborah Mayer launched in 2024. Mayer was a successful car racer herself and created a women’s motorsport team of the same name to promote equality in this male domain. She had the same thing in mind when she turned her attention to show jumping and provided talented women with the best horses to ride. This also included Sophie Hinners, whose gray My Prins now goes by the name Iron Dames My Prins. It was he who accompanied Hinners to her first championship, the European Championships in La Coruña, where the German team won the bronze medal and Hinners’ partner, Richard Vogel, became European Champion in the individual classification.