Who Wins the FEI Eventing World Championships at Aachen?

Twenty one years ago Zara Phillips won European gold at Blenheim on Toytown. A year later she went to Aachen and won the world title. European champion to world champion, back to back.

Both championships have since come round to the same two venues. The Europeans returned to Blenheim in September 2025 and Laura Collett won individual gold there on London 52. The World Championship now returns to Aachen, and Collett can walk Zara's exact path in the same span of time. One year, two venues, two titles.

The EquiRatings Prediction Centre says she's the most likely combination to do it. But the most competitive horses in the world still stand between her and the finish. Five percent cover the top three and below them the numbers fall away quickly

Laura Collett London 52 Horse age 17

Twenty four percent is the highest win chance in the field and 46% is the highest podium chance.

The record underneath it belongs to a in and out championship horse: London 52. Individual bronze in Paris. European gold at Blenheim. Six senior championships behind him at seventeen years old, alongside a rider with eight of her own. His best performance of 2026 is the 105 HPR he posted winning at Belsay in May.

What makes him favourite is that he needs Aachen to be nothing in particular. He can win on the flat and he can win if the cross country turns hard. Every other combination in this field needs the week to break a certain way.

Michael Jung fischerChipmunk FRH Horse age 18

Jung is the probably only one who can beat Collett on the first day. A dressage average of 19.9 is the best at Aachen and it stands 2.7 penalties clear of London 52 on 22.6.

Part of the reason he sits at 19% instead of on top is more recent. Two fences down at Avenches in July left the pair in eleventh.

That doesn't changes what he is. Reigning Olympic champion, seven senior championships, and at 932, fischerChipmunk FRH is the highest rated horse in the world. Germany will build the team around him.

Rosalind Canter Lordships Graffalo Horse age 14

Lordships Graffalo has a claim as the best five-star horse the sport has produced. Two Burghley wins, and this spring he became the first horse in history to take a third Badminton. That run gave him his 106 HPR, the highest of anyone here bar Tom McEwen.

He is third on the win line for one reason. The dressage cannot match Jung or Collett. His 42% podium chance is second in the field, which tells you the model expects him there at the end without expecting him to lead.

His route to the front is a hard track and a time nobody catches. Aachen has the ground and the atmosphere to make cross country influential. If it does, the leaders start handing penalties back, and Lordships Graffalo is the horse best built to collect them. He was European champion in 2023 on exactly that formula.

Tom McEwen JL Dublin Horse age 15

JL Dublin won the European title in 2021 with Nicola Wilson. McEwen took the ride and third at Blenheim last year is their best championship result together.

The 107 HPR at Kronenberg in March is the highest mark of McEwen's career, above anything he produced on Toledo de Kerser, Pau five-star win included. It is also the highest season-best in this field. At 13% and 33% he is the closest thing here to a fourth favourite.

Line the British three up and the depth becomes the story. The last three European champions are all at Aachen and all British: JL Dublin in 2021, Lordships Graffalo in 2023, London 52 in 2025. The same three combinations won Olympic team gold in Paris. Three horses, three continental titles, one team.

Below McEwen the Prediction Centre drops to 4% and keeps going. Those figures carry no verdict on quality. They measure how often the simulations produce a week in which all four of the horses above come unstuck at once.

Gemma Stevens Flash Cooley Horse age 14

Stevens is the highest of them at 4%, and Flash Cooley is the best rated championship debutant in the field. One habit explains it.

He does not add penalties. Five runs in a row going back to August 2025, he has finished on his dressage score. Chaumont en Vexin, Burnham Market, Kronenberg, Lignières, Wellington. Clear inside the time across country and clear show jumping, every time.

Three of those came at four star level this season. No other horse in the sport has done it more than once in 2026 and most have not done it at all. Flash Cooley has three while the rest of the top-level has no more than one.

The mark itself sets his ceiling. Those five scores sit between 24.4 and 27.6, which leaves him four to seven penalties adrift of Jung before a fence is jumped. He wins by standing still while the leaders move backwards. Aachen may well produce that exact championship.

For Stevens this is a return as much as a debut for the horse. She has not been named on a senior team since Tryon in 2018, where Britain won team gold. Rio, Strzegom and Blair Castle came before it. Aachen is her fifth senior championship, and her first in eight years.

Astier Nicolas Alertamalib'Or Horse age 16

Nicolas is the hardest combination here to price, and 3% reads as uncertainty rather than doubt.

He has not run at four or five star all year. One international start in 2026, a CCI3*-S at Saumur in April, won on 26.2 without adding a penalty.

The championship record is thin yet exists. Pratoni in 2022 and Blenheim last year, where a frangible pin cost eleven penalties and he still came home sixteenth while France took team bronze.

William Coleman Diabolo Horse age 14

Coleman won Kentucky this spring and the model has him at 2%. The gap between those two facts needs explaining.

Diabolo does not run often. Injury took time out of his career and Coleman has managed what is left by picking targets rather than filling a calendar. Two international starts in 2026, Raeford in March and Kentucky in April. The Kentucky win produced a 102 HPR. He had already taken the CCI4*-S there in 2024, which made him the first horse to win both classes at the venue.

What the model sees is a thin sample and so they may be underrated. Watch out for Diabolo: fourteen years old, no senior championship to his name, and America's best chance of a medal.

Julia Krajewski Uelzener's Nickel Horse age 12

Krajewski has already won on this ground. Uelzener's Nickel took the 2024 Aachen title, and he arrives off winning the German National Championships at Luhmühlen in June for a 104 HPR, the best of his career. On current form he belongs above 2%.

Experience is what he is missing. One senior championship, Paris, where he was a ten year old and finished eleventh. Krajewski left him at home for the Europeans at Blenheim, judging the hills would not suit him. Aachen is flatter ground but a harder question.

At twelve he is the youngest horse of these top 10 contenders. Krajewski is the Tokyo individual gold medallist on Amande de B'Neville and she has seven senior championships behind her. The rider is not the variable in this one.

Nicolas Touzaint Diabolo Menthe Horse age 13

Touzaint rode the 2006 World Championships on this ground, on Hildago de L'Ile. He is one of only six riders at Aachen who was here for it. He now arrives for is 17th senior championship.

Diabolo Menthe was part of the French team that took silver in Paris. He has only run internationally three times since those Games. Jardy at three star in July 2025, Lignières in September 2025, and Strzegom in April this year, second in the CCI4*-L for a 95 HPR.

The pattern reads as a horse held back and pointed at one week. The model treats a light season the way it treats Nicolas's and prices both similarly. Aachen is the one venue where twenty year old knowledge might be worth a placing.

Monica Spencer Artist Horse age 15

Spencer's case rests on the cross country, and it has a clear ceiling. Artist is a full thoroughbred with a huge stride, and the tighter the time gets the better he looks.

Howeverm the last phase has cost him both of his recent five stars. At Maryland last autumn he led into the show jumping and finished second. At Kentucky in April he led again, dropped three rails, and William Coleman went past him on Diabolo to take the title. Artist finished seventh.

The dressage is why that still counts as a good week. He scored 22.3 at Kentucky and came home on 36.7 even after twelve jumping penalties and 2.4 time. Start low enough and the final phase stops being fatal. It may cost him the win but not an impressive finishing position.

Which is why the number to hold him to is not the 2%. He is 30% for the top ten, and that is the realistic target. Give Aachen a severe track and a time nobody catches and he can build a buffer big enough to survive a rail or two.

The shape of the Prediction Centre is a four horse race with a long tail, and everything in the tail waits on the same thing. A cross country that asks a real question. A time nobody catches. A leaderboard that starts moving backwards on the final day.

Keep Aachen a dressage championship and Collett or Jung wins it. Make it harder than that and the horses who never add come into view.

Zara Phillips needed one year to turn Blenheim into Aachen. Laura Collett has the same year, the same two venues, and the best number in the field.

* Horse championship counts are total senior starts regardless of rider. fischerChipmunk FRH includes the 2018 World Equestrian Games at Tryon with Julia Krajewski. JL Dublin includes the 2021 European Championships at Avenches with Nicola Wilson.

Senior championships counted are Olympic Games, World Championships and WEG, and senior Continental Championships. Young Horse, Pony, Junior and Young Rider championships are excluded.

Season‑high HPR is the best 2026 mark at CCI4* or CCI5* only.