Yesterday, Thursday April 20th, Kate Shoemaker and Vianne, her 10-year old Hanoverian mare born at Hilltop Farm in Colora, won individual gold in the FEI Para Grand Prix Test A – Grade IV at the 2026 FEI Para Dressage World Championships in Aachen, Germany. In so doing, the pair scored 78.889% to break the Grand Prix Test A world record. Vianne is by Vitalis out of Raureif (Ramiro’s Bube).
Shoemaker, who is based in Wellington, Florida, is a Grade IV athlete with partial paralysis of her right leg as a result of Periventricular leukomalacia, a brain injury that occurred at birth. This is the second time that she and Vianne have broken a world record. They broke the record for the Grand Prix Test B in April 2026, also at Aachen.
This is not a new partnership for the pair. They made their international debut with several victories above 70% at the Doha CPEDI, Qatar in February 2024, and went on to win bronze at the Para Olympics in Paris in 2024. They anchored the U.S. Para Dressage Team throughout the 2025 season, helping win the Adequan Global Dressage Festival III in Wellington (Florida), the TerraNova CPEDI (North Carolina), and the Hagen CPEDI3* at Hof Kasselmann (Germany). Shoemaker scored a personal best of 81.725% at Hagen.
This year, Vianne had already won six CPEDI3* competitions before winning the individual gold at Aachen. Among them were three Grade II world records in three starts at Hagen – 78.85% in the Grand Prix A Test, 80.444% in the Grand Prix B Test (with all three judges awarding 80% or higher), and 84.934% in the Freestyle, a winning margin of more than 18 percentage points – anchoring the U.S. team to a gold-medal finish over Canada.
The team finals at the World Championships take place August 21 and August 22. Were Vianne and Shoemaker to qualify, they would also contest the Freestyle World Championship on Sunday, August 23.
Vianne’s dam, Raureif (GER), has several other successful dressage progeny.
Her 2024 filly Frasera (by Farrell) won Grand Champion Dressage Sport Horse Breeding at the Made in the Shade breed show in South Carolina on August 9 this year.
Her 2019 son Sir Render (by Sir Donnerhall) is currently competing Third Level.
Her 2017 son Virtus (by Vitalis) is competing First Level.
We will update this story as we receive information about the team finals.