Kyra Kyrklund as first equestrian in Finland’s Sports Hall of Fame –

“Finland is crazy about sport,” emphasizes Kyra Kyrklund. All the greater is the honor of being the first equestrian in the country to be inducted into the Sports Hall of Fame. The ceremony will take place next Thursday, January 12 and will be televised. “It’s important to the country’s equestrian sport, and of course I’m delighted with this honour,” Kyrklund told St.GEORG. “But obviously it’s not just for me, but for all the people who have helped me along the way.”

When active, Kyra Kyrklund (71) was one of the best dressage riders in the world and learned from Herbert Rehbein, among others. Her most successful horse was the stallion Matador. She wore it to the silver medal at the 1990 World Equestrian Games in Stockholm and made it the winner of the 1991 World Cup Final in Paris. Furthermore, the two were fifth at the 1988 Olympics in Seoul.

In addition to Matador, Kyrklund has brought many other horses to the big sport, such as the Russian stallion Trakehner Edinburg, with whom she finished fourth at the World Equestrian Games in The Hague in 1994 and at the European Championships in Lipiza in 1993, as well as third in the final of the World Cup in Gothenburg in 1994 . Then there was Flyinge Amiral, who accompanied her to the World Equestrian Games in Rome 1998 and the Olympic Games in Atlanta 1996, and more recently Max, with whom he accompanied her to the World Equestrian Games in Aachen 2006, the Hong Kong Olympic 2008 Kong, the European Championships 2007 in Turin and 2009 in Windsor and participated in two World Cup finals.

Together with Max, who by the way was the son of the also internationally successful Master of Kyrklund, Kyra Kyrklund retired from the sport, initially rode young horses at home in England and then competed in one or two tournaments, but their priorities had changed.

Kyra Kyrklund gave many lessons when she was still active. She still does today, and with great success. Cathrine Dufour is currently one of her best known students. Kyra Kyrklund was the one who found the key to explaining her piaffe to Cassidy. But you also trained Nathalie zu Sayn-Wittgenstein, Emma Hindle, Jan Brink and many others.

Kyrklund is also the national coach of the Portuguese dressage riders and gives regular lessons at various stations in Sweden. She is a professor at the Uppsala University of Agricultural Sciences, works at Strömsholm and Flyinge and gives theoretical and practical lectures there.