Scott Brash made show jumping history in 2015. No one has come close to matching his feat

Scott Brash and his bay gelding Hello Sanctos entered the Spruce Meadows ‘Masters’ in 2015 on the cusp of history.

After back-to-back wins at two major show jumping competitions — in Geneva, Switzerland, and Aachen, Germany — the 29-year-old was one victory from becoming the first rider to capture the Rolex Grand Slam of Show Jumping, and scooping a €1 million ($1.2 million) bonus.

Just before the finish, Hello Sanctos brushed a pole but that was as bad as it got as the pair jumped a clean round inside the time limit to win a third straight major, claiming the sport’s most coveted prize.

“It’s difficult enough to win one of those Grands Prix in your lifetime, let alone three in a row,” Brash told The Athletic.

The Grand Slam of Show Jumping began in 2013, when organizers for Aachen, Spruce Meadows in Calgary, Canada and Geneva, approached Rolex to create the ultimate challenge for the world’s best riders, modeled on the golf and tennis majors. The Dutch Masters in ‘s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands, was added to the roster in 2018.

Any rider who wins two events in a row gets a €500,000 ($580,000) bonus, while three consecutive victories secures the Grand Slam, plus a €1 million ($1.2 million) payout. Winning four straight majors nets a €2 million ($2.4 million) bonus. The victories must be consecutive but don’t have to be in the same calendar year.

“The prime example is Aachen,” Brash said, citing the German event as the toughest obstacle to achieving the coveted hat-trick.

Known as the Wimbledon of equestrian sport, 29 of the world’s top 30-ranked show jumpers were at the annual event when Scott was trying to make it two in a row.

“In a normal week, probably you would have 12 or 15 of the top 30. It’s quite rare to have nearly 30 out of the top 30 in the world in the same show,” Brash said. “It shows that every rider wants to go to those majors. It attracts the best horse-rider combinations.”

Winning the Grand Slam requires a broad set of skills from both rider and horse. The Geneva and Dutch Masters are both staged in indoor sand arenas, where horses have to be able to turn quickly or risk making a mistake. Aachen and Spruce Meadows are both on grass, in vast arenas with tens of thousands of spectators, which benefits experienced horses with a big pair of lungs and a calm demeanor. In show jumping, one small error or one fence down, can be the end. (To find out more about the five equestrian events and the rules, read our guide here.)

Only one other rider, American McLain Ward, has even won two consecutive majors since the inception of the Grand Slam format. He triumphed in Geneva in 2022 and in ‘s-Hertogenbosch in 2023, before retiring in Aachen after his 17-year-old Belgian warmblood mare, HH Azur, knocked down two rails at the start of the opening round.

Brash began his run to the Grand Slam in Geneva in December 2014, but things really began to amp up when he won a second-straight major in Aachen the following summer.

“I wasn’t thinking of winning the whole Grand Slam back in Geneva,” Brash said. “It was just trying to win that Grand Prix. But I don’t think it really becomes reality until you win Aachen as well, or whatever the next leg is. Then you think, ‘oh, is this possible to be done?’”

All eyes were on Brash and Belgian-bred Hello Sanctos at Spruce Meadows in September 2015.

“There was a lot of media attention, lots of interviews leading up, lots of questions asking whether it can be done,” Brash said.

“It brings added pressure but you just have to focus on your horse and the competition. We were focused on having Sanctos there in the best possible shape he could be, and executing our plan the best way we saw fit, to give him the best chance of being able to win the Grand Slam.”

Getting over the line, with friends and family watching on, released a wave of emotions.

“So many different feelings go through you,” Brash said. “There was elation. It was probably all we were thinking about from Aachen, which was a couple of months earlier — every day, just focusing on that competition. The closer I got to it, it was the only thing going through my head. When I won, it offloaded all the feelings and emotions.”

When a rider wins a major, they become a “live contender” for the big prize. Richard Vogel of Germany took that mantle this spring when he won the Dutch Masters on United Touch S.

While no other competitor has won the Grand Slam, Switzerland’s Martin Fuchs is tied with Brash with five major victories. Germany’s Daniel Deusser and Marcus Ehning, Steve Guerdat of Switzerland and Kent Farrington of the U.S. have all won three.

It can’t be done without a great horse, of course. Though a Grand Slam can actually be won by a rider using different horses, the closeness of the partnership is absolutely crucial to success. Brash paid credit to Hello Sanctos, with whom he had won Olympic and European team gold and reached the top of the jumping rankings.

“He was nine years old when I met him and the feeling was very good to start with,” Brash said. “I felt like he had very good attributes. But I don’t think you could ever have said he was going to go on and achieve all the titles that he did achieve.

“The bond and relationship and partnership evolved throughout the years, and I think what made him so special was how clever he is.

“The communication between the two of us was really quite unique in horse-rider combinations. I really understood him. He really understood me. That’s what showed in the titles that he won, that we had a good connection together.”

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