Documentary by Verheul van Schiermonnikoog selected for the Film Festival

Fri 04 November 2022 09:07

SCHIERMONNIKOOG – The documentary ‘The Successor’ by Thom Verheul van Schiermonnikoog has been selected for the Milan Festival. The international sports documentary is about the best Dutch coach Richard Westerink. Verheul followed the trotter trainer for a year.

The film offers a unique image of the success of 43-year-old Richard Westerink, who races with his best horses in France, Italy, the Netherlands, the United States and Sweden, has already won several world titles and has won millions of euros in prize money.

Richard Westerink is based in France – the largest harness sport country in the world – and is causing a stir there with 8-year-old Etonnant. Westerink has already won more than 2 million euros in prize money with the stallion.

Thom Verheul, filmmaker and documentary maker who has won several international awards, has closely followed Richard Westerink and his superhorse Astonishing for more than a year. This gave him a unique image of the international world of harness racing. Richard Westerink travels the world to participate in the most prestigious races with his super horse Astonishing.

Millions are at stake and Westerink and Astonishing know all the ups and downs on and off the track. The international roller coaster that Westerink finds himself on eventually led Verheul via Paris to Stockholm. The world sprint championship (Elitloppet) was expecting it in May. In Sweden, Astonish faced the impossible task of following in the footsteps of his illustrious father (Timoko), with whom Westerink has won the world title twice in the past.

International attention
The documentary, which lasts more than an hour, has been selected for the 40th Milan International FICTS Festival in the Sport Movies & TV 2022, Great Champions category. This is the final of 20 festivals around the world of the world television championship “World FICTS Challenge”. The selection is a tremendous confirmation of the work of Verheul and his film crew. The festival is organized from November 9 to 13 and is part of the International Federation Cinema Television Sports. The film will be screened on Saturday November 12 at 12:30 p.m. in the Trafalgar room of the Hotel Admiral in Milan.