THE PREMIER JUMPING LEAGUE IS COMING IN 2027
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A new professional showjumping league with F1 level funding and broadcast ambitions just received FEI approval. The Premier Jumping League, launching in 2027, represents a significant shift in how international showjumping may be structured and marketed.
What is the PJL, exactly?
The Premier Jumping League is a franchise based professional showjumping series modelled on sports like Formula One and football. Instead of the traditional FEI World Cup circuit and Grand Prix events, the PJL will feature city-based franchises competing against each other in a structured season. Backers have committed 300 million dollars in guaranteed prize money, with an F1-style broadcast partner handling rights and distribution.
The league is deliberately structured around compelling television. Events will be held over one day rather than multiple days. The 1.60-metre jumping classes are deliberately restricted to a single day per event as a welfare measure. The format is designed to fit broadcast windows and audience attention spans, not traditional horse show scheduling.
Why this matters
This is not showjumping’s first attempt at a franchise model. The Global Champions League, launched in 2016 alongside the long-running Longines Global Champions Tour, already operates as a franchise league in most senses that matter: city and venue-named teams, pooled prize money of roughly €22 to 25 million a year across the GCT and GCL combined, its own broadcast channel in GCTV, and team merchandise.
So the PJL is not introducing the franchise concept to showjumping, it is scaling it up dramatically and competing directly with the model it is copying. Where the combined GCT and GCL circuit distributes roughly €22 to 25 million a year, the PJL has committed 300 million US dollars in guaranteed prize money across 14 events, a sum that dwarfs anything the sport has seen. It has also signed Box to Box Films, the production company behind Formula One’s Drive to Survive, to handle its documentary and broadcast strategy, and has already sold its first franchise, the McCarthy Jumping Team, for 50 million US dollars ahead of the league even launching.
Whether that works remains to be seen, but the financial backing and FEI approval suggest this is not a one-season experiment.
The McCourt connection
The PJL’s founder and chairman is Frank McCourt, the American billionaire who previously owned Major League Baseball’s Los Angeles Dodgers and currently owns French football club Olympique Marseille. McCourt was also a co-founder of the Global Champions League and, until he sold his stake around 2022, ran his own GCL team, the Miami Celtics.
This means that this is not an outsider bringing a foreign sports mode but the co-creator of showjumping’s first franchise league returning several years later to launch a bigger, better-funded rival to the league he helped build.
What this could mean for the sport’s structure
The PJL creates a parallel professional pathway, and the most direct competition is with the GCL rather than with the FEI Grand Prix circuit generally. Both are franchise leagues chasing the same pool of top 250 riders, the same sponsors, and the same broadcast attention. Riders and owners will need to weigh a GCL franchise against a PJL one, not choose between a franchise league and a fragmented alternative. Prize money distribution will shift, and some events on the traditional circuit may lose prominence if sponsors and broadcasters consolidate around whichever league wins the audience battle.
This is not unprecedented in sport, though the closer parallel is not Formula One versus national motorsport; it is two competing franchise leagues in the same sport, the way LIV Golf emerged to challenge the PGA Tour. The question for showjumping is whether the PJL’s far larger prize pool draws riders and teams away from the GCL, whether the two coexist by splitting the calendar and the talent pool, or whether one absorbs or outlasts the other.
There is also the welfare dimension in play here. The deliberate restriction of 1.60-metre jumping to a single day per event is framed as a welfare safeguard, acknowledging that back-to-back high-level rounds over multiple days create stress for horses. That standard, if it becomes expected in professional showjumping, could influence FEI event structure over time.
Why it is interesting here
South Africa does not currently have riders competing regularly at the highest levels of international showjumping on a regular basis (although Aachen is fast approaching). However, the PJL represents a shift in how professional showjumping is organised and distributed globally. Understanding that shift helps South African followers of the sport grasp the bigger picture of where international riding is headed.
The franchise model, the broadcast emphasis, the guaranteed prize structure: these are not just administrative changes. They reflect a professional evolution that affects how the sport is accessed, how careers are built, and where the economic incentives point. For riders with international ambitions, the PJL will eventually matter to career decisions. For fans, it will be impossible to ignore if the league gains the audience traction its backers expect.
For now, the inaugural 2027 season will answer the crucial questions. Can another franchise showjumping league attract enough riders and an audience? Will the broadcast model work? Can it coexist with traditional FEI competition? The answers will shape the sport for years to come.
Sources
FEI announcement: The Premier Jumping League receives FEI Series approval ahead of inaugural 2027 season. 1 July 2026.
The Plaid Horse: The Premier Jumping League receives FEI series approval ahead of inaugural 2027 season. 1 July 2026.
Sportcal: McCourt-backed PJL sells first franchise for $50m ahead of launch. Late June 2026.
Equi Pages: Premier Jumping League PJL, competition for the Global Champions Tour. 30 March 2026.
Global Champions League official rules and team information, gcglobalchampions.com; Wikipedia entry for the Global Champions Tour.