Willem GreveOlympian

About Willem Greve

Willem Greve, born on 26 February 1983 in Haaksbergen in Overijssel, is a Dutch Olympic showjumper, horse producer and sport-horse trader. He grew up at De Watermolen, the veterinary, breeding and stallion operation led by his father Jan Greve, an environment that gave him early exposure to conformation, pedigree, soundness and the commercial side of horse production. After completing HAVO he spent about two and a half years apprenticed to Henk Nooren at Guttecoven, which he credits with teaching him riding, trading and the recognition of talent, before returning to Twente in 2004 to start his own operation. From 2007 he spent roughly three years at Jeroen Dubbeldam's stable in Weerselo, and he has named Dubbeldam as the most influential person in his career. His own business, Willem Greve Sportpaarden B.V., is now based at a purpose-built complex in Markelo. As a youth rider he won the Twente Cup on ponies in 1993, became Netherlands riding-style champion in 1994, made ten European Championship appearances from pony to Young Rider level with seven different horses, and won four European team medals: Junior bronze at Hortobágy in 2000, Junior silver at Gijón in 2001, Young Rider silver at Le Touquet in 2003 and Young Rider bronze at Vilamoura in 2004. He was named Rabo Talent of the Year in 2003.

Greve's senior breakthrough came with Carambole, the 2004 Holsteiner stallion he rode from four years old. The pair made his senior championship debut at the 2013 European Championships in Herning, finishing sixth by team and 34th individually, then won the Amsterdam, Drachten and Hardelot Grands Prix in 2015 and the La Baule and Rotterdam Nations Cups in 2016. Their final major success was the Longines FEI Jumping Nations Cup Final in Barcelona in October 2021, the stallion's last international appearance; he was formally retired at Jumping Amsterdam in 2023 and died on 6 July 2025 after a field accident. Greve has described Carambole as the horse who made him a better horseman as well as a better rider, and the stallion went on to be an influential sire. The same period established his young-horse record, with five-year-old World Breeding Championship bronze on Formidable in 2015, the five-year-old world title with Garant at Lanaken in 2016 and seven-year-old silver with Grandorado TN in 2018.

His championship record is one of consistent presence without a senior medal. He made his Olympic debut at Tokyo 2020, staged in 2021, with Zypria S N.O.P., finishing 31st individually after four faults in qualification; he rode in the team qualifier and the Netherlands went on to finish fourth in the final, for which Harrie Smolders and Bingo du Parc replaced the combination. He was selected for the 2022 World Championship in Herning but a fall that July broke his ankle and upper arm and ruled him out before the event. In 2023 he was tenth individually and seventh by team at the Milan European Championships with Highway TN N.O.P., and in 2025 nineteenth individually and sixth by team at A Coruña with Pretty Woman van't Paradijs N.O.P. He was named to the Dutch team for Paris 2024 with Grandorado TN N.O.P., but after the venue training session the combination was replaced by Kim Emmen and Imagine before the team qualifier, the stallion having been reported not to be at full physical form; Paris is therefore recorded as a selection rather than a second Olympic appearance. His verified senior Olympic, World and European medal total is nil.

Against that, his record of major victories is substantial. He is a three-time Netherlands senior champion on three different horses, taking the title at Deurne in 2022 with Highway TN, in 2024 with Grandorado and in 2025 with Pretty Woman, the last completed without a jumping fault, and adding senior silver in 2026 with Candy Luck Z. In March 2024 he won the Rolex Grand Prix of The Dutch Masters at 's-Hertogenbosch with Highway TN, beating Henrik von Eckermann and King Edward by four hundredths of a second - a Rolex Grand Slam Major, 's-Hertogenbosch being one of the four Major venues alongside Geneva, Aachen and Spruce Meadows - and he identifies the home five-star victory as a defining career achievement. In the World Cup he won his first qualifier at Leipzig in January 2025 with Highway, then Stuttgart and A Coruña later that year with Pretty Woman and Gothenburg in February 2026 with Grandorado, taking the 2025/2026 Western European League title on 81 points. He was seventh in his first World Cup Final at Basel in 2025, and withdrew after the first competition at Fort Worth in 2026, classified 35th, saying the mare was physically fine but that the combination was not in the right shape. He has also won Nations Cups at La Baule, Rotterdam, Sopot, Dublin and Barcelona, and back-to-back Best of Champions titles at The Dutch Masters in 2025 and 2026, the latter with four clear rounds on four different horses.

Willem Greve Sportpaarden B.V. combines training, production, elite competition, selective sales and stallion management from a boutique nineteen-stable complex at Markelo, with a 20 by 40 metre indoor arena, roughly 2,600 square metres of all-weather outdoor surface, a jumping field, lungeing area, horse walker and covering facilities. Its defining feature is a long-term partnership with Team Nijhof, which has retained approved breeding stallions such as Grandorado and Highway for top sport rather than removing them to stud duty alone; Highway has since been leased to the American rider Lillie Keenan. Greve's riding is described in his own clinic teaching as a matter of patience, consistency and repetition, treating each horse according to temperament and construction and returning to straightness and basic control when problems appear on course. No reliable public turnover, income or net-worth figure exists, and registered horse shares should not be read as a guide to private wealth.

At the 3 August 2026 cut-off Greve was 43, active for the Netherlands and sixteenth with 2,496 points on Longines list 306 dated 1 July 2026, with 3,683 FEI starts and 136 wins recorded since 1 January 2010. He has been selected with Grandorado TN N.O.P. for the FEI Jumping World Championship at Aachen alongside Bas Moerings, Michael Greeve and Harrie Smolders, with Mathijs van Asten as travelling reserve; the competition is scheduled for 16 to 23 August 2026 and had not begun, so the selection is recorded as a nomination and no result is stated. Dutch chef d'équipe Wout-Jan van der Schans has identified a top-seven team finish and Los Angeles 2028 qualification as the realistic objective. Aachen would be Greve's first completed senior World Championship, and with Grandorado now 15 the pair's readiness cannot be assumed in advance; behind them, Pretty Woman, Party In De Hus and Cero Blue TN represent the succession.