Wellington, FL – November 27, 2025 – Some of the world’s best show jumpers, highlighted by eight Olympic riders, headline a stellar starting lineup for this year’s 123rd Annual National Horse Show and Family Festival. The show, in its fifth year in Florida, gets underway on November 29, 2025 and runs through December 3, at the Palm Beach Polo Equestrian Club on Pierson Road in Wellington.
The Open Jumper Division, offering $316,000 in total prize money, is highlighted by the $100,000 Rolex/USEF National Show Jumping Championship, offered for the first time ever at the National Horse Show. The Rolex sponsored event will be contested in two phases, one on Friday night under the lights, and the second on Sunday afternoon. Both phases will be held in the Internationale Arena. In addition to the $50,000 offered in each part of the main event, the top two overall finishers will divvy up an additional $25,000 in bonus pool money.
Along with the fabulous prize money offered, Phase One of the Rolex/USEF National Show Jumping Championship is also an East Coast League World Cup Qualifying event. The 2007 Rolex World Cup Finals are in Las Vegas, Nevada, in April. Friday night’s class is the first of only five classes remaining that offer riders a chance to qualify for the World Cup Finals. The top seven riders in the East Coast point standings will book a trip to Las Vegas in April.
Other special classes for the Open Jumpers include the $5,000 Palm Beach Post Welcome Stake on Wednesday afternoon, the $15,000 National Horse Show Speed Classic on Thursday afternoon, and $10,000 National Horse Show Speed Stake on Saturday.
The 2004 Athens Olympic Team Gold Medalist, and this past summer’s World Equestrian Games Team Silver Medalist, McLain Ward, headlines this year’s starting line-up. For the third year in a row, Ward comes to the National Horse Show after galloping to victory in the World Cup Qualifier Grand Prix at the Royal Winter Fair in Toronto, Canada, just two weeks ago.
Ward will be joined by Margie Engle and Laura Kraut, his teammates from the World Equestrian Games Silver Medal team. Engle was just recently named the American Grand Prix Association Rider of the Year for the tenth time in her amazing career. Kraut, who has amassed seven World Cup Finals appearances, spent most of 2006 in Europe with a major win at Birmingham, England, and top finishes at Lucerne, Rotterdam and at Barcelona. All three riders were part of the United States Samsung Super League team that finished with a world wide second place finish this year.
Other United States Olympians scheduled for this year’s National Horse Show include Nona Garson, Lauren Hough and Todd Minikus, who competed on the 2000 U.S. Show Jumping team at the Olympics in Sydney, Australia.
International Olympic stars Mario Deslauriers and Jaime Guerra are also on this year’s starting line-up card. Deslauriers is a two time Canadian Olympian, having competed in Los Angeles in 1984, and in Seoul, Korea, in 1988. Guerra has twice represented his home country of Mexico on the world’s greatest stage, riding in the Olympics at Barcelona, Spain, in 1992 and in Atlanta, Georgia, in 1996.
Molly Ashe, the winner of last year’s $100,000 Lexus National Horse Show Jumper Championship, returns again this year. Ashe had a tremendous summer in Europe, representing the United States on the Super League team and notching major victories in the Grand Prix of Dublin and the Queen Elizabeth Cup at Hickstead, England.
Other top competitors this year include Kimberly Prince, the highest placed American rider at the last World Cup Finals in Las Vegas in 2005, Aaron Vale, one of the two winningest riders in U.S. show jumping history and Christine McCrea, a Super League team member and winner of this year’s $100,000 American Gold Cup in Cleveland, Ohio.
Jumper action gets underway on Wednesday AT 3 p.m. The Palm Beach Post Welcome Stake takes center stage at the Internationale Arena.
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