August 14, 2026 
By most standards, 10 minutes isn’t a lot of time. Unless maybe you’re boiling pasta—or in the middle of a cold plunge.
But for the riders taking on Saturday’s FEI Eventing World Championships Team & Individual Cross-Country course, the expected 9 minutes and 50 seconds gallop will be a defining moment in their careers.
Created by Italy’s Giuseppe Della Chiesa—a course designer with 24 years of experience who previously worked on the FEI Eventing European Championships course in Pratoni—Saturday’s cross country is somewhere between a 4*-S and 4*-L level. It includes 42 efforts on the direct route, including two water complexes, but 74 fence options in total. (You can view the course map here.)
“There’s a lot of thought going into the options, because there’s so many different choices if something’s going wrong,” says the USA’s Phillip Dutton, who scored a 32.6 in dressage with his partner of four years, the 11-year-old Holsteiner gelding Denim. The seven-time Olympian is returning to the World Championships in Aachen two decades after he last competed there with Connaught in 2006.
“Obviously, the first and second water [complexes are] strong, and then the bank coming off of those angle lines—the direct way at the top is quite a big vertical. And then, coming home off the mound to the angle corner is pretty on the money, there, if there’s a bit of horse left [under] you.
“Obviously, the second-last jump, there’s not much room for error there,” Dutton added of the Mercedes-Benz Challenge combination, noting that he was planning to study the course more closely on Friday to finalize his plan.
“There’s plenty to jump,” agrees 25-year-old Kumru Say of Turkey, who sits on a score of 38.7 after dressage. “[Baladin de l’Ocean LA] is not the biggest scope, not the biggest stride, but we have good partnership, and he’s all heart,” she says of the 15-year-old Anglo-Arab gelding.
“He comes out of the start box and tries his hardest, and [it’s the] same from my side. So, I’m looking forward to [cross country].”
Germany’s Libussa Lübbeke is equally enthused. “I think it’s a good course for our situation—I think it will be really intense. There are many, many jumps,” says the 25-year-old European team gold medalist, who sits on a score of 31.3 after dressage with the Caramia FRH. “It’s quite hard work.”
Hard work for the riders, as well as the Course Designer, who put extra thought into how he would cope with Aachen’s notoriously flat cross-country terrain. “[Aachen] is very different from Pratoni,” Della Chiesa told the FEI this week.
“Let us just say when you have a bit more terrain you can get more easily inspired,” he said. “There are some artificial mounds where you can alter the balance a little and create some interest.”
Della Chiesa has also factored in turns that won’t impede the flow of the track, as well as options that are safe for all of the combinations on the startlist, some of whom will not have not had extensive experience at the 4* level. In order to qualify for the World Championships, riders either needed to complete a 5*, or one 4*-S and one 4*-L.
“We are trying to provide an appropriate route for every combination, with different options that allow riders to make the best decision for themselves and their horses,” he said.
One combination Della Chiesa is likely not overly concerned about is the world’s No. 5-ranked eventer, two-time Olympic team gold medalist Tom McEwen and his 2024 Paris partner, JL Dublin. The British rider currently sits within striking distance of the top of the leaderboard on a dressage score of 26.6.
“I think it’s very fair, there’s lots of angle slices, lines, many decisions to be made and probably starting off with a plan that might change three times on the way around, depending on how you go,” McEwen assesses.
“I think the time’s going to be tight, and [Della Chiesa] has delivered some amazing questions [all] the way round,” he adds, noting that the appearance of the course and the footing in Aachen was “fantastic.”
“It’s a cracking track.”
