News & Events

Even though Rolex and Badminton are over, Mary King is still as busy as ever! We find out what she has been up to for her latest blog... 

"It's been rewarding to concentrate on Chubby and Jay, who are both intermediate level, during May," she says. "A number of their events had been canceled earlier in the season so the runs at Aston Le Walls (Chubby 8th and Jay 2nd), and Rockingham Castle (both good dressage tests and quiet double clears) prepared them well for Tattersalls CCI**, their main aim for the Spring season. We had a quick turn around after Houghton Hall horse trials where I was just Mummy and groom for Emily who rode two in the junior CCI*."

Our sponsored rider, Victoria Bax is now back in the land of the living following her nasty fall at Hambleden International on 21st April.

"Crysto and I were contending the Intermediate class and typically doing rather well until the penultimate cross country fence which resulted in me ending up in The Royal London Hospital having a tear to my Intestines repaired," Victoria tells us. "I have now been out of hospital for 3 weeks and am recuperating at home."

It has been a busy 2013 so far for Geoff Billington, with his wedding at the start of the year and subsequently travelling around the world to compete, however now he is back in the UK for the summer shows and things are looking positive! 

"Last weekend I was in Copenhagen with the team and Upper Cut jumped a clear round in the first roundm, which was crucial as I was anchorman and needed to go clear to get us to the second round, then we had 4 faults in the second round but it was really promising," says Geoff. "Upper Cut was also clear in the Grand Prix with one time fault. Previous to that we went to Magna Racino in Austria, near Vienna, where Upper Cut competed in 3 Grand Prix classes and was 8th, 2nd and 5th. He was also 3rd twice in two more ranking classes."

We catch up with Mary King after Rolex and Badminton to find out how the prestigious 4 star events went...

"Fernhill Urco flew from Stansted airport to Chicago on the Wednesday before the Rolex Kentucky Three Day Event. He then went from Chicago to Lexington by road after a short quarantine period. Liz Brown, the team vet, was on the flight and you are only allowed one other so William Fox Pitt’s groom, who had flying experience, also travelled with the horses. My groom Lauren flew a couple of days later and waited for them on arrival. That part of the trip went smoothly at least! Urco was in good character and full of life when he got there. I competed at Hambleden and then got back Sunday night, drove to William’s yard and we both went to Heathrow together and flew with Yogi Breisner to Kentucky. The park at Lexington is so lovely, in the last few weeks I feel very privileged to have been in not one but two stunning locations!

It certainly hasn't been an easy start to 2013's eventing season for Victoria Bax and a rotational fall at Hambleden International meant an eleven day stay in hospital. Read on to find out more...

"So for me my season is starting with many ups and downs. After the first few events being cancelled due to the rain etc, I managed to squeeze Crysto in for a run H/C in the Novice section at Burnham Market International where he scored a great dressage of 31, then sadly got rather excited in the show jumping arena as it was on a surface, so quite tight for space, and positioned alongside the cross country start! So you can imagine Crysto found this way too exciting therefore losing his concentration for the most part and taking down three rails with him. He then excelled himself in the first round of the season to produce an effortless clear round cross country with some time penalties, although to be honest I wasn't pushing for time knowing that I couldn't be placed due to riding H/C.

Steph updates us on her experience at the Winter Dressage Championships and looks forward to a great summer with Mr P!

"Well we did the championships and we survived," she says! "I was second to go in the class and Mr Hyde did exactly as he was told, we made no major mistakes but our sheet was almost blank! We scored 64% but there were very few comments as to why - which was a shame!"