A few days before the opening ceremony, Aachen is getting ready to once again become the heart of the equestrian world. For almost two weeks, the Soers will revolve entirely around the World Championships, bringing together a large part of the absolute world elite of riders, horses and nations. But behind the sporting spectacle lies a huge logistical operation: tonnes of hay, kilometres of cable, hundreds of horses, tens of millions of euros. Welcome to the numbers behind a World Championships that clearly doesn't do anything by halves.
From 11 to 23 August, Aachen brings together a large part of what international equestrian sport has to offer. Six disciplines are on the programme: jumping, dressage, eventing, para-dressage, driving and vaulting.
The organisers speak of 814 participants and 814 horses for the World Championships themselves, coming from around 70 countries. Add the youth competitions — 65 participants and 65 horses — and the total comes to 879 participants and 879 competition horses.
On top of that: 250 extra horses for the opening ceremony and 200 more for Allianz Park Day.
188 riders in jumping, 92 combinations in dressage
Jumping logically provides one of the largest contingents, with 188 riders and 188 horses. 32 national teams and 36 individual riders are expected. The team final takes place on Friday evening, with the individual decision following on Sunday.
In dressage, the organisers are counting on 92 combinations, with 19 national teams of three or four riders and 17 individual starters. Grand Prix, Special and Freestyle follow one another until the Grand Prix Freestyle on Saturday evening.
Eventing features 90 combinations and 16 national teams: dressage on Thursday and Friday, cross-country on Saturday, and jumping with medal decisions on Sunday.
Para-dressage brings together 94 riders and 94 horses, spread across five grades. Driving counts 54 four-in-hand drivers. And vaulting, with 295 athletes and lungers on 80 horses, is the discipline with the largest number of participants — although endurance is missing from the programme this time.
177 medals — with weight towards Los Angeles
In total, 59 gold, 59 silver and 59 bronze medals will be awarded: 177 in total. In the team rankings for jumping, dressage, eventing and para-dressage, these World Championships also count as the first qualification opportunity for the Olympic and Paralympic Games in Los Angeles 2028.
55 tonnes of hay to feed them all
For the sport horses, the organisers have arranged 22 tonnes of concentrated feed, 55 tonnes of hay and 17 tonnes of straw, plus 1,900 bales of shavings. The veterinary setup includes endoscopy, digital X-ray, ultrasound and an on-site lab with rapid PCR testing.
The facilities have also been upgraded: new lighting in the main stadium, renovated roofs, a new dressage surface, an extended cross-country course, new stables meeting current welfare standards, and improved accessibility, particularly for para-sport.
€42.5 million budget
The total budget comes to €42.5 million: €30 million operational and €12.5 million in investments.
It takes 1,500 people to keep everything running, including 90 FEI judges and officials, 85 FEI stewards, more than 450 support staff and more than 50 medical staff, plus emergency services and doctors, and 70 drivers.
On the media side, 600 accredited journalists and photographers are expected, along with more than 250 TV staff. In Germany alone, more than 30 hours of international broadcast coverage is scheduled on ARD, ZDF and WDR.
45 kilometres of cable
The exhibitor village is set to include 200 companies, more than 300 pagoda tents and 23,000 m² of tent space. To power it all, 45 kilometres of cable will be laid. Setup takes ten weeks, requires 75 truckloads and at least 1,500 tonnes of material.
And then there's this: 358,310,400 blades of grass
Among all the statistics, the organisers also managed to produce a figure nobody had asked for: the main stadium is said to contain 358,310,400 blades of grass. Not a rounded "roughly 358 million" — an exact number. Also worth noting: 2.9 km of wooden fencing, 4.2 km of hedging made up of 30,000 plants, and 340 trees, including 129 lime trees and 79 birches.
Aachen already knows the drill
The organising club ALRV, founded in 1898, has already hosted 15 championships at the Soers, including four jumping World Championships (1955, 1956, 1978, 1986), the 1970 dressage World Championships, the 2006 World Equestrian Games and the 2015 European Championships. Twenty years after the WEG, the sport is returning to familiar ground.
Around the event itself, the free "Aachen WM Special" runs from 11 to 23 August in the historic city centre, and on 17 August, Allianz Park Day opens the grounds with a family programme.
