Last week, Robert Whitaker announced the retirement of his long-time partner Catwalk IV (Colman x Corleone). With Whitaker, Catwalk IV has had a long and successful career and at the age of 18 he now gets to enjoy a well-deserved retirement. 

“Catwalk is part of the family he owes us nothing, he's taught me so much over the last 10 years, we shared some eventful times but also a lot of success. It was very important to us he finished his career at the top of his game and sound so he can enjoy his retirement. I would also like to thank everyone who's been involved with him as they are also part of the success story,” Whitaker wrote on his official Instagram account. 

With Robert Whitaker in the saddle, Catwalk IV won both the CSI5* Grand Prix and World Cup in Helsinki in 2019, as well as during his career taking big wins in Braunschweig, Bolesworth, Gothenburg, Hickstead, Kiel, Lausanne, Madrid, Mannheim, Vejer de la Frontera and Windsor – to mention some. If you want to know more about the secret to Catwalk’s fantastic career, click here for our series ‘Still Going Strong’ where we spoke with Robert Whitaker as well as Uwe Carstensen and Steve Guerdat about the gelding.

With this photo special, we wish Catwalk a happy retirement!

All photos © Jenny Abrahamsson for World of Showjumping.