Cayman’s young equestrian riders recently learned tips from a top pro.
Some 16 young riders from Cayman Riding School returned from a trip of a lifetime in the UK. During the two-week vacation the riders visited the training stables of top international event rider Katie Lucas.
Katie, who is a member of the British Eventing team, is based at Littleton Manor Equestrian Centre. The venue has received the recognition of being chosen as a pre-games training centre for the London 2012 Olympics.
Cayman Riding School owner Tracey Surrey spoke about the experience.
“The facilities were amazing and Katie went out of her way to make us feel welcome,” Surrey said. “The children were given an in-depth view of the hard work and dedication it takes to compete at top level. Katie was very impressed by our riders and several of them have been invited to return next year as “working students” which is a great honour from such a highly ranked international rider.”
For the record the riding school is located in Savannah. Surrey is a fully qualified British horse society riding instructor.
During the UK trip the kids spent two days attending The Royal International Horse Show – which is the official horse show of the British Horse Society at the Hickstead Show Grounds in East Sussex.
There the children were introduced to top international show jumpers such as Olympic team medallists Tim Stockdale and John Whittaker. Having trained and competed at the national level in the UK before moving to Cayman, Surrey states many of the competitors were old friends.
“It was such a fantastic opportunity for my young riders and we bring back so many happy memories – however I could not help but wish I was a little younger and still competing against my old team buddies.”
Having trained in Cayman for several months, the children were really put to the test when examined by the British Pony Club. This was especially challenging for the young riders as they had to take their exams on horses they had never ridden before in totally unfamiliar surroundings. However the previous hard work paid off and all riders passed their exams with flying colours. The British Pony Club stated it was, “so unusual to have such a large group of children from one riding school that far exceeded the level of skill and knowledge that would normally be expected from children of their age.”
The children finished the trip by competing in a horse show at an equestrian centre very close to the Kickstead Show Grounds. The Cayman children got a chance to try out against other riders with far more competition experience. Though it was very challenging for the Cayman team (they all competed on unfamiliar horses) they all excelled.
In particular Dane Muspratt rode brilliantly to come a very close second in the advanced jumping class. From there Kelsey Bodden won her class and Amara Thompson rode extremely well but was very unlucky with just one jump down.
Surrey states she is proud of all of those efforts.
“As their riding instructor I took that to be a huge compliment. The British Pony Club examiners are testing thousands of children a year – it means we must be doing something pretty good back here in Cayman.
“The idea of the trip was to show our young riders the sport of equestrian at the highest level and experience so much more than they would normally be exposed to in Cayman. It also gave me the opportunity to have my riders evaluated by a top examiner – so I can see how we are doing compared to ‘the real world.’
“All our riders came away with several rosettes. We were unbelievably lucky with the British weather and whilst it was a lot of hard work and I’ve returned to Cayman totally exhausted – the whole trip was so much fun, I’m already making plans for the next one.”
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