Teus van den Brink can smell a good showjumping horse at a distance. The list with international showjumping horses, even 1.60m Grand Prix horses, from his stables is long, but also hunters, equitation horses and lovely horses for amateurs come from Nijkerkerveen in The Netherlands. He is still regularly scouting at shows, but more often than not comes home empty-handed. Horses performing at shows are expensive and that is why he now also visits auctions to buy young talent at an early stage. He auctioned young showjumping talents himself at his own ‘Sale of the Rising Stars’ and has also become involved with the online VSN Horses Auction. Horse Auctions Europe has six questions for him.

You have been buying a large number of foals at auctions in the past few years. Why so?

“Because it is harder to find older horses for me to sell. The real pearls, I often have several among my foals. But I do like following foal auctions, and if you don’t like it, don’t do it. Ideally you buy a three-, four- or five-year-old, but riders nowadays often want to keep a good horse for a longer period to train them further, they are also too expensive or owned by private persons who do not want to get rid of them. In order to fill my stables with good horses, I started buying at foal auctions some nine years ago.”

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