United States Eventing Association

Fifth generation horse breeder Charlotte Schickedanz (Toronto, Ontario) has been involved in the breeding of Trakehners since she was born and has seen many of her family’s homebreds go on to successful careers in various disciplines in her lifetime.

“My dad [Gerhard Schickedanz] and his family came from the border of what was called East Prussia and Lithuania, before the second world war changed those borderlines, where they bred Trakehners,” she shared as she traced back her roots in the horse breeding industry. “At the turn of the previous century, his family were the largest horse dealers in Europe–they would trade around 12,000 to 15,000 horses a year.”

Both her father and mother, Elma Schickedanz, were refugees who came to Canada in 1951 with the hopes of starting life over in a more peaceful atmosphere.

“They came with nothing,” she said. “My father and his brothers started a construction and land development business, and in 1960 they bought a farm here just 30 minutes from downtown Toronto and just started back in the horse business lightly. There was a woman that had brought some Trakehners from Germany, so my father and his brothers bought a few mares from her, and that’s kind of how it started on this side of the ocean.”

In 1970, her father had the chance to travel back to Europe for the first time since relocating, and he purchased two mares and a stallion to bring back to his new homebase, Schickedanz Galten Farms. That December a colt was born that would go on to become one of the most famous show jumpers in history–Abdullah.

“It was all sort of serendipity,” said Charlotte as she reflected on how the young horse fell into the right hands as a 3-year-old and went on to have such an impressive career helping the United States win team gold and claiming individual silver at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics, winning the 1985 FEI World Cup Final in Berlin, and earning another team gold and individual silver at the 1986 Show Jumping World Championships in Aachen.

While Charlotte had four older brothers, none quite had the interest in the breeding operation that she had. She grew up in the business, and after getting her degree, came back home to run the 70-horse operation. She’s been spending her years perfecting the bloodlines her father started with and producing some amazing horses along the way, one of which is the 2025 Bates USEA Mare of the Year, the 13-year-old Trakehner/Westphalen cross Freedom GS.

Freedom (Humble GS x Friedel GS) traces back to the legendary Abdullah on her dam’s side, and on her sire’s side you will see another famous GS bred horse—the 1987 Pan American Games dressage bronze medalist Amiego who is a maternal brother to Adullah. Amiego has become a very prominent sire in the highest performing GS horses to this day.

When it came time to put those bloodlines to the test, Freedom was sent to Canadian Olympian Jessica Phoenix, who Charlotte teamed up with over a decade ago. Charlotte knew from an early age that “Freedom” had the potential to be special.

“She’s got some energy, like her mother,” she said. “She’s a bit wound, but she has a good build—she’s very compact and nimble. She’s unique because she has had this great career as an eventer, but she also shows in the jumping ring and wins at the 1.30 to 1.40-meter level.”

At the time that Freedom was being produced as a young horse, Phoenix was helping Charlotte by riding and showing her homebreds in preparation for sale, but it was quickly noted that Freedom would require just the right rider to channel her enthusiasm for the job, and that rider truly was Phoenix.

“We started really picking up on how incredible this horse was, and we just looked at each other and said, ‘We can not sell this horse,’ ” reflected Phoenix. “She was just so special.”

While Phoenix represents Canada, she spends the majority of her year showing in the United States.

“Competing in the States is a huge benefit to us as Canadians,” noted the rider. “We really don’t have a lot of selection of events in Canada anymore. We have Bromont, which is the only four-star FEI event in Canada, and it runs twice a year. Other than that we have, I think, three venues that run up to Intermediate between Ontario and Quebec. To be an eventing competitor in Canada, it takes a lot of passion and dedication, especially as you get higher in the levels, because you have very few events that you can obtain qualifications at. It is a necessity to compete in the States as a Canadian rider competing at this level.”

Phoenix has used the eventing calendar in the U.S. strategically to help Freedom tick the boxes as she progressed. After winning the CCI3*-L at the VHT International & H.T. (Lexington, Virginia) in the fall of 2022, the pair moved up to the four-star level in 2023 at The Event at TerraNova (Myakka City, Florida). They had their first long-format at the four-star level later that summer in their home country at Bromont where they had a top-10 finish. Their performances at the upper-levels from 2023 to 2024 earned them a ticket to Paris to represent Canada at the Olympic Games.

But Freedom’s successes didn’t stop there. She had a stellar 2025 season, winning the CCI4*-S at The Event at TerraNova in March, placing third in the highly competitive CCI4*-S at the Defender Kentucky Three-Day Event. Just a month later, they won the CCI4*-S at Bromont. Charlotte and Phoenix decided a trip to Aachen in July would be wise to prepare Freedom for a potential spot on the Canadian team at this year’s FEI World Eventing Championships which will take place at the venue, and seeing the mare compete there was extremely sentimental to her breeder.

“Abdullah won the Jumping World Cup in Berlin in 1985 and then won team gold at the World Championships in Aachen in 1986, and then Freedom was in Aachen last year as well as a little prep run for the World Games,” she said. “To have a horse back there 40 years later; it gave me goosebumps because we breed these horses, we don’t buy them. People buy horses all the time, look at the money spent, but you can’t buy success. You can try, but since we breed them—this is all from the ground up. It’s a lot of years and a lot of work, so to have two horses in my lifetime represent their country is pretty cool.”

“Freedom was phenomenal,” said Phoenix as she looked back on their year together. “She is such a competitive horse. Last year she really felt strong in her body and so solid in her mind that I could really take the training wheels off and let her go— and she loved it. It was, for sure, one of her top seasons ever, both in the jumper ring and in the eventing ring. To be able to go to Aachen with her was an amazing experience that we will never forget.”

The partnership Phoenix has created with Charlotte and the many horses in her program is not one that she takes for granted.

“I am so grateful that we have been able to work together and produce these incredible horses,” she noted. “I feel really positive about the future with the GS horses. They are creating some of the best horses in the world, and I just feel so fortunate and blessed that they are just 45 minutes from where I live.”

And the feelings are reciprocal.

“I love Jessica,” said Charlotte. “She loves a $10 horse or a $10 million dollar horse. She is just unique in that regard. She will give a horse the benefit of the doubt a million times over. Sometimes I might think I wish she would move on from one, but you know what? That’s what makes her who she is. It’s difficult to find someone like her in our equestrian world, whether it’s jumping, eventing, or dressage. She is very unique, and she has a lot of humility. She always sees the positive, she is a very positive person.”

Both Charlotte and Phoenix’s eyes are firmly set on the future. They both want to see Freedom earn a spot representing Canada at the LA28 Olympics, which would be a full circle moment for Charlotte as a breeder having one of her horses competing on the Olympic stage at LA for a second time in her lifetime, but Charlotte is also thinking ahead about the next generation to come at GS farms.

“Freedom turns 14 this year, so I said to Jessica that I want to have some of her genetics,” noted Charlotte. “I don’t want to wait, because you never know what can happen, so in March we are working with a company called ViaGen to do ICSI [Intracytoplasmic Sperm Injection] because we do want to have her genetics in the tank. So we will see where the rest of the journey goes.”