Justin — Horse Story
So this is the story of a huge horse called Justin Guzzy van’t Asschaut.
We called him “Mokhnach” — which means “hairy creature” — as when we initially got him he had fur like a mammoth.
This happened much more recently, probably around 2017.
At the time we were, as usual, casually looking at horses out of curiosity at the absolute bottom level of the market. The true bottom.
Places like marktplaats.nl and tweedehands.be. That is where all kinds of strange creatures appear for sale.
So suddenly we saw the listing:
• enormous horse
• completely unclear description
• 185 cm tall
• just turned eight years old
• surprisingly good breeding
• and no price stated
So naturally we went to see him.
We arrived somewhere near Venlo in the Netherlands to a typical riding school. They brought out this gigantic animal.
We went there together with Sofia, who is very small herself — and next to her stood this absolute dinosaur of a horse with a long typically local name: Justin Guzzy van’t Asschaut.
The woman selling him did not even really know what price to ask. She was basically studying our faces trying to calculate how much money we might be willing to give her: not too much, not too little.
Eventually she asked for a relatively small amount. I will not even mention how little.
“Fine. We’ll take him.”
The next day we came back, paid, loaded him into the trailer — where he almost did not fit.
And then, after receiving the money, the woman happily admitted:
"Oh this is wonderful. I can’t believe I sold him. I actually got him for free myself from the stables on the other side of the road. They were already preparing to put him down and I said — I will pay the cost of removing the corpse. That is how I got him. So happy now."
The reason was his throat surgery.
He was born with a condition called “roaring,” where the throat structures do not open correctly for breathing during exercise. Normally this can be improved surgically.
But his surgery had gone wrong. The second one — by the vet’s opinion — went even worse.
From our point of view he was breathing fine. He no longer made the roaring noise — but he also could not really neigh anymore. And water constantly came out of his nostrils when drinking.
The woman was honestly just thrilled that anybody had paid anything for him at all. She probably would have sold him for five times less than we paid.
So we brought him home. And he seemed to be completely happy with life. He jumped willingly. Worked willingly. Everything was fine.
Apparently after all his previous owners and all the medical drama, he had slowly been moving toward the conclusion that he was destined to be euthanized.
But nobody had informed him personally.
His jumping technique was very special.
He jumped one-meter fences by literally standing up on his hind legs like a dinosaur and launching himself from hind legs to hind legs. No bascule. No elegant shape. No careful front legs. No classical technique admired by modern jumping experts. Just: vertical dinosaur launch sequence.
But he had a good character. Very uncomplicated. Very easy mentally.
Also he was a strong and powerful horse that never thought he had any breathing problems. He was sure — he had no health problems at all. And we completely agreed with him.
Things developed quickly.
Within about three months, Kir and Justin started jumping their first international 145 cm classes. That is the entry level for proper ranking international competitions before 150 cm classes and Grand Prix level.
They competed at CSI Lummen and performed very well.
By then, after four months with us, Justin had also updated his jumping technique. He stopped jumping in his dinosaur style and began jumping like a normal horse.
With his size he barely needed effort anyway. For him, 180 cm fences probably felt emotionally similar to one meter.
Not an Olympic horse, obviously. But perfectly functional.
He later competed in Grand Prix classes with us. Then travelled to France competing successfully again.
After about a year and a half with us he moved on. The horse was fully fit for the purpose. His way moved on — to new owners in Moscow, Russia.
And there he became a legend of his level.
He carried countless riders through World Cup qualifiers, puissance classes, national championships and so on. He was jumping with young riders and juniors, proving to be a horse that “does everything himself”.
And he is still jumping smaller classes with children and juniors there now at 17 years of age, remaining fit and strong.
Interesting communication happened while we were still competing him in Europe before he left for Russia.
One day an unknown woman wrote to us on Facebook, as we published his photo from jumping in France.
She asked: "Is this really the same Justin Guzzy competing internationally with you?"
We answered: "Yes."
And she replied: "I was one of his previous owners."
She explained that she had spent some time trying to make him “breathe normally” to be able to ride, trying specialists, trying different approaches — but eventually became convinced that the horse could never handle serious exercise and probably could not even breathe properly under effort.
And therefore she had decided that putting him down would be the best option for him.
She literally wrote: "I thought it would be kinder to send him to death."
We simply sent back a smiley face on Facebook.
So by now, almost 10 years later, we are in contact with his current people and see him when we go there.
Justin is alive and jumping in Moscow now. Still making people happy. Still fit and strong himself, planning something like at least 10 more years in retirement.
The last, but not least, is to mention that we never had any issues about his health, also at horse inspections or warm-ups at FEI competitions.
He was always fit, normal looking, not making any distracting noises or anything of that kind.
As to the water — the fact that some of it was coming out from his nostrils never bothered him.
So what was the correct way for him?
To put him down at 8 years old because it seemed to those around him that he “was not capable”, “was constantly suffering”, “would never be able to” and that “all veterinary help was useless”...
Or not.
Just to look at how the animal really behaves, really expresses himself and let him go as far as he wanted himself.
So this is the story of a huge horse called Justin Guzzy van’t Asschaut.
We called him “Mokhnach” — which means “hairy creature” — as when we initially got him he had fur like a mammoth.
This happened much more recently, probably around 2017.
At the time we were, as usual, casually looking at horses out of curiosity at the absolute bottom level of the market. The true bottom.
Places like marktplaats.nl and tweedehands.be. That is where all kinds of strange creatures appear for sale.
So suddenly we saw the listing:
• enormous horse
• completely unclear description
• 185 cm tall
• just turned eight years old
• surprisingly good breeding
• and no price stated
So naturally we went to see him.
We arrived somewhere near Venlo in the Netherlands to a typical riding school. They brought out this gigantic animal.
We went there together with Sofia, who is very small herself — and next to her stood this absolute dinosaur of a horse with a long typically local name: Justin Guzzy van’t Asschaut.
The woman selling him did not even really know what price to ask. She was basically studying our faces trying to calculate how much money we might be willing to give her: not too much, not too little.
Eventually she asked for a relatively small amount. I will not even mention how little.
“Fine. We’ll take him.”
The next day we came back, paid, loaded him into the trailer — where he almost did not fit.
And then, after receiving the money, the woman happily admitted:
"Oh this is wonderful. I can’t believe I sold him. I actually got him for free myself from the stables on the other side of the road. They were already preparing to put him down and I said — I will pay the cost of removing the corpse. That is how I got him. So happy now."
The reason was his throat surgery.
He was born with a condition called “roaring,” where the throat structures do not open correctly for breathing during exercise. Normally this can be improved surgically.
But his surgery had gone wrong. The second one — by the vet’s opinion — went even worse.
From our point of view he was breathing fine. He no longer made the roaring noise — but he also could not really neigh anymore. And water constantly came out of his nostrils when drinking.
The woman was honestly just thrilled that anybody had paid anything for him at all. She probably would have sold him for five times less than we paid.
So we brought him home. And he seemed to be completely happy with life. He jumped willingly. Worked willingly. Everything was fine.
Apparently after all his previous owners and all the medical drama, he had slowly been moving toward the conclusion that he was destined to be euthanized.
But nobody had informed him personally.
His jumping technique was very special.
He jumped one-meter fences by literally standing up on his hind legs like a dinosaur and launching himself from hind legs to hind legs. No bascule. No elegant shape. No careful front legs. No classical technique admired by modern jumping experts. Just: vertical dinosaur launch sequence.
But he had a good character. Very uncomplicated. Very easy mentally.
Also he was a strong and powerful horse that never thought he had any breathing problems. He was sure — he had no health problems at all. And we completely agreed with him.
Things developed quickly.
Within about three months, Kir and Justin started jumping their first international 145 cm classes. That is the entry level for proper ranking international competitions before 150 cm classes and Grand Prix level.
They competed at CSI Lummen and performed very well.
By then, after four months with us, Justin had also updated his jumping technique. He stopped jumping in his dinosaur style and began jumping like a normal horse.
With his size he barely needed effort anyway. For him, 180 cm fences probably felt emotionally similar to one meter.
Not an Olympic horse, obviously. But perfectly functional.
He later competed in Grand Prix classes with us. Then travelled to France competing successfully again.
After about a year and a half with us he moved on. The horse was fully fit for the purpose. His way moved on — to new owners in Moscow, Russia.
And there he became a legend of his level.
He carried countless riders through World Cup qualifiers, puissance classes, national championships and so on. He was jumping with young riders and juniors, proving to be a horse that “does everything himself”.
And he is still jumping smaller classes with children and juniors there now at 17 years of age, remaining fit and strong.
Interesting communication happened while we were still competing him in Europe before he left for Russia.
One day an unknown woman wrote to us on Facebook, as we published his photo from jumping in France.
She asked: "Is this really the same Justin Guzzy competing internationally with you?"
We answered: "Yes."
And she replied: "I was one of his previous owners."
She explained that she had spent some time trying to make him “breathe normally” to be able to ride, trying specialists, trying different approaches — but eventually became convinced that the horse could never handle serious exercise and probably could not even breathe properly under effort.
And therefore she had decided that putting him down would be the best option for him.
She literally wrote: "I thought it would be kinder to send him to death."
We simply sent back a smiley face on Facebook.
So by now, almost 10 years later, we are in contact with his current people and see him when we go there.
Justin is alive and jumping in Moscow now. Still making people happy. Still fit and strong himself, planning something like at least 10 more years in retirement.
The last, but not least, is to mention that we never had any issues about his health, also at horse inspections or warm-ups at FEI competitions.
He was always fit, normal looking, not making any distracting noises or anything of that kind.
As to the water — the fact that some of it was coming out from his nostrils never bothered him.
So what was the correct way for him?
To put him down at 8 years old because it seemed to those around him that he “was not capable”, “was constantly suffering”, “would never be able to” and that “all veterinary help was useless”...
Or not.
Just to look at how the animal really behaves, really expresses himself and let him go as far as he wanted himself.