The Dutch Masters, formerly known as Indoor Brabant is an international horse show held in 's-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands. The show is held every year in March and one of the biggest international equestrian indoor events in The Netherlands, besides Jumping Amsterdam. Indoor Brabant-The Dutch Masters takes place in the Brabanthallen.[1]
The event is host of the FEI World Cup qualifier dressage and the prestigious Grand Slam of Show Jumping combination with shows and entertainment. The show-jumping includes the 5* CSI Grand Prix. Besides the World Cup dressage, several CDI competitions are part of the event. The program also includes national dressage classes and a class for para-equestrian riders.[2]
The first edition of Indoor Brabant was in 1966, founded by a group of local people from Tilburg to honor show-jumper Toon Ebben. The founders Ton Jansen, Harrie van Dijk and Henk Brands wanted to organize the new international horse show in Tilburg but there was no space available so the three men found a location in The Brabanthallen in 's-Hertogenbosch. Because the men were from Tilburg, the mayor of 's-Hertogenbosch wanted to have someone from the city itself to be president of the show. Daddy Stibbe, father of Eddy Stibbe became the president of Indoor Brabant and was able to create a successful event from the beginning. In 1979 Indoor Brabant became part of the World Cup Jumping circuit.[3] In 1983 dressage was added to the event's program and became part of the World Cup Dressage circuit in 1986, hosting the first World Cup Final for dressage riders in history. The final was won by Danish Anne Grethe Jensen. The dressage World Cup Final took place for eleven times at Indoor Brabant, while the organization hosted the World Cup final for show-jumping two times in 1994 and 2012. Since 2014 In 2017 the organization decided to change the name 'Indoor Brabant' to 'The Dutch Masters' to attract a bigger international audience since the show became part of the Grand Slam.[4]
Because of the Covid-19 pandemic the event was cancelled in 2020. In 2020 the organization had to cancel last minute, even though the show was about to start. On the first day of the event, the Dutch prime-minister Mark Rutte gave a press conference and decided to cancel all current events.[5] Also in 2001 the show was cancelled because of a swine fever. In 2021 the event took place without spectators and had only show-jumping on the program.
The list of winners includes the winner of the Grand Prix in show-jumping, which is not the World Cup. From 1979 until 1985 there was no Grand Prix and was replaced by the World Cup. The World Cup jumping has been part of the program since 1979 until 2013, including two World Cup Finals won by Dutch Jos Lansink in 1994 and American Rich Fellers in 2012. The Grand Prix of 's-Hertogenbosch was replaced by the Grand Slam from 2014 onwards.The dressage winners includes also the winners of the World Cup Finals, which replaced the World Cup Grand Prix qualifier.[6]