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Winners in focus: Yuri Mansur and Vitiki

Tuesday, 28 January 2025
Interview

Photo © Nanna Nieminen/WoSJ. Yuri Mansur and Vitiki started 2025 by winning the CSI5*-W 1.55m Championat City of Basel – the Golden Drum, and then went on to top the CSI5*-W 1.55m Championat of Leipzig. Photo © Nanna Nieminen for World of Showjumping.

 

Text © World of Showjumping

 


 

After an accident at the end of last year that could have had fatal consequences, Yuri Mansur’s 17-year-old gelding Vitiki (Valentino 240 x For Expo) has started 2025 looking stronger than ever winning the CSI5*-W 1.55m Championat City of Basel and topping the CSI5*-W 1.55m Championat of Leipzig a week later. “He is a really generous horse,” Yuri Mansur says about Vitiki. “He is a horse that really tries to do his best in everything he does.”

“We call him Wolverine in the stable, because he always finds a way to come back," Mansur says. "In December, we had a really bad accident with the truck that he was travelling with on the way to La Coruña and it is amazing that he is back to winning only a month later."

The comeback king

Photo © Jenny Abrahamsson/WoSJ. “We call him Wolverine in the stable, because he always finds a way to come back," Mansur says about Vitiki. Photo © Jenny Abrahamsson for World of Showjumping.

And coming back is something Vitiki has done throughout his career. “Vitiki’s life story is unbelievable,” Mansur told WoSJ in March 2023 about the chestnut gelding who arrived in his stables at the end of 2017. “He was nine at the time, and at this point the biggest he had jumped was a 1.35m. A little over half-a-year later, in May 2018, he was clear and had one down in the CSIO5* Nations Cup in La Baule where Brazil won. One month later, he was clear in the Prize of Europe in Aachen.”

Vitiki’s life story is unbelievable

 

However, during the second round of the Prize of Europe in Aachen in 2018, Vitiki suffered a freak accident and broke his leg. “I already had hard days in my life but that was for sure the hardest of them. The three years that followed were really tough. I’m not a person that gets easily down, but I was no longer the same as I used to be – I lost a bit my confidence, and I lost the pleasure to ride.”

Mansur never gave up on Vitiki though, and the gelding returned to competition in the fall of 2019 – but more setbacks followed. “In 2020, I took Vitiki to Wellington – and we had many ups and downs,” Mansur tells. “Then Covid struck, we went back home, and he just did not feel like the same horse he used to be – he did not have the same scope, he was much hotter than he had been, he jumped a lot to the left... But, at the end of that year, he was third in the first Grand Prix in Vilamoura – and from there on it got better. Step by step, my confidence came back to me. However, then we discovered a tumour in Vitki’s nose that had to be removed. It was a terrible surgery, and he needed three months of recovery. Nevertheless, not long after, in La Baule in 2022, he was second in the Grand Prix.”

Back to his best

Photo © Jenny Abrahamsson/WoSJ “I'll jump the World Cup qualifier in Bordeaux with him because he feels really good at the moment, and if I qualify for the World Cup Final in Basel he will be my choice for it," Mansur says about Vitiki. Photo © Jenny Abrahamsson for World of Showjumping.

Six-and-a-half-years after breaking his leg in Aachen, and only a month after the terrible truck accident, Vitiki seems to be in the form of his life. “After the World Cup Final in 2023, Vitiki felt like he was in the best shape of his career,” Mansur explains. “But then he got an infection in all four frogs. It was really, really difficult to find a solution for it and he wasn’t able to compete. For a moment, I thought that was it for him, that his career had come to an end. However, I brought him to Stephan Währli – a renowned Swiss blacksmith – and that changed everything; you could not compare him with the horse he had been at the beginning of the year. He returned to competition and won the Championat of Basel in 2024; the same class we won again this year.”

The feeling I have on him now, I never had before

 

Recovering fully and finding back his confidence took time. “When the winter started, he was jumping better and better, but my feeling was not the same as before. I was even thinking that maybe now is the time to step him down, to take him to the shows as the second horse for the smaller classes,” Mansur explains. “However, when we were in Geneva in December something switched. Even though we had a big fault there, Vitiki somehow came back to his best, or maybe even in better shape than ever. The feeling I have on him now, I never had before.”

“I don't have a big plan in mind for him,” Mansur says about his goals for the season ahead. “I'll jump the World Cup qualifier in Bordeaux with him because he feels really good at the moment, and if I qualify for the World Cup Final in Basel he will be my choice for it.”

Working on the fundamentals of going fast

Photo © Jenny Abrahamsson/WoSJ “Now, when I look back, I didn't have the right technique to go faster," Mansur says. Photo © Jenny Abrahamsson for World of Showjumping.

While Vitiki has done another amazing comeback, Mansur has made a huge effort on his part – focusing on his jump-off strategies. “As everybody more or less knows, I started my career relatively late and I have only been in Europe for the past 10 years,” he explains. “Before, I was much more of a horse dealer and producer than a rider. I think what I learned more during my career was how to train a horse and how to produce it; that was always was my main focus. When I got more competitive as a rider, I started to be clear or placed quite consistently; the percentage of clear rounds was getting higher, but the percentage of victories was low – which was frustrating.”

I have looked at what and where I'm doing wrong, and I worked directly on those points

 

“I am the kind of person who always tries to improve in everything I do, and I wanted to understand where I was going wrong,” Mansur continues. “Now, when I look back, I didn't have the right technique to go faster. Every time I was in a jump-off, I was trying to go as fast as I could without thinking so much, without understanding what I was doing. But then I started to look to the fastest riders to see what they were doing. I started to learn about trajectory, how to approach corners… the fundamentals of going fast. I have looked at what and where I'm doing wrong, and I worked directly on those points.”

“When you can grow at this level, it is already really exciting, but I am surprised of how much I have improved in a short period of time,” Mansur concludes.

 

 

28.1.2025 No reproduction of any of the content in this article will be accepted without a written permission, all rights reserved © World of Showjumping.com. If copyright violations occur, a penalty fee will apply. 



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