Endurance GB Young Rider Champion sets sights on British team for 2020 European Championships

Endurancegb.co.uk

- (Published:17 July 2019)

Endurance GB’s new Young Rider Champion, Suffolk-based Madison (Maddie) Pomroy, has spoken of her dream of representing her Team GB at next year’s Young Rider European Championships.

The teenager landed the title after a strong performance riding Roz Plail’s horse Odie in the 120km class at The King’s Forest Ride near Thetford.

Maddie, 17, has been competing in the sport for the past six years after completing her first endurance ride, covering 64km in two days with her pony Milky Way, aged just 11.

“My grandmother Jane Girling got me involved as she has been competing in endurance for a long time. I was slightly thrown in at the deep end doing a two-day ride and I kept saying, ‘I’m really tired’, but my grandma wouldn’t let me give up. It was a real eye-opener and I was hooked.”

The King’s Forest is a happy hunting ground for Maddie as she completed her first 120km ride there the day before her 16th birthday with her grandmother Jane’s horse Zaferan back in 2017.

“We train over similar countryside around the forest tracks near the Suffolk coast so Odie has got used to the going in East Anglia having moved here from Devon last autumn,” she says.

“It was my first International 2* (120km) ride and I wasn’t sure how we would get on. I misjudged things slightly at the start as we went off quite strongly. But helped by my crew of my grandmother, Jane, my father Chris and sister Ella and with assistance from Bella Fricker who pitched in to help at one of the crew points, he was soon back on track. On the first loop, I was leading the UAE riders but let them go past as Odie was getting wound up. On the second loop I caught them up again. I rode the last loop with Martin McNamara, [the race winner from Ireland], but let him go on ahead as I didn’t want a racing finish and wanted to make sure we completed safely to secure the title.”

“Odie is just a fantastic horse and it is such a great opportunity to be able to ride him. I learned a lot from this ride to help us for the future and our plan is to compete next at Euston Park in August and then if things go well, we will try for the British Young Rider team going to the European Championships in Spain next summer.”

Odie’s owner Roz Plail said: “A huge thanks must also go to Tim and Sarah Dennis for taking Odie into training at their racing stables in Cornwall, whilst I was pregnant and then poorly, and getting him in such fabulous race ready condition for when Maddie started loaning him in October. All credit to Maddie too for maintaining his fitness levels over the winter months. I am excited to see how they progress over the rest of the season.”

Katie Bedwin, 21, from Rudgwick in West Sussex was named Reserve National Young Rider Champion with Aberllwyd Ibn Phariz, owned by Welshpool-based Sue Higgins.

Katie is currently in her final year of a paediatric nursing degree from the Royal Alexandra Children’s Hospital in Brighton. She has represented Great Britain in Young Rider teams previously and is aiming for the Young Rider World Championships in Italy this year. She was also introduced to the sport by her grandmother Rosemary Attfield, a renowned trainer and former team selector and coach...

Read more at:
https://endurancegb.co.uk/main/news#2019071701

45 Riders Will Contest the 11th Annual Mongol Derby

Horse-canada.com - Full Story

July 15, 2019 | Comments
by: Mongol Derby

There are crazy things to do – and then there’s the Mongol Derby. Featured in the Guinness Book of Records as the world’s longest and toughest horse race, this is the 11th year that 45 men and women from the four corners of the earth will race 1,000km across Mongolia on semi-wild horses, next month.

They range from a 56-year-old Texan cowboy to a helicopter pilot from Alice Springs, a paleo-botanist from The Netherlands and a management consultant from South Africa, via a host of saddle-hardened (they’ll need to be) girls and boys from the racing world. All think they are fearless and ready for the most extreme adventure of their lives – we’ll see… Some will crash and burn.

2019 MONGOL DERBY DETAILS
August 4-6: Pre-race training
August 7: Start gun of the 2019 Mongol Derby
August 16: Final riders expected to finish

Meet the entrants:
https://horse-canada.com/horse-news/45-riders-contest-11th-annual-mongol-derby/

South Africa: Cold temperatures didn’t interfere successful Fauresmith 2019

Endurance-world.com - Full Article

16th July 2019
Race Report made with the assistance of Manie Ward

Fauresmith, Frees State Province, South Africa. Fauresmith 2019 was run from Tuesday 2, Wednesday 3 and Thursday 4 July 2019.

This years’ Fauresmith race, as was for the last 46 years, run in the small little town Fauresmith being the second oldest town in the Orange Free State. After Bloemfontein, Fauresmith was the most important town in the Free State. The first House of Assembly had to choose between the two to determine which would become the capital of the Free State. On 30 August 1851, the vote went to Bloemfontein with a two-vote majority.

Fast forward to July 2019, the temperatures dropped below zero and a rainy cold front swept over the pre-vet check on Monday, which forced the official to halt the proceeding for close to an hour. After completion of this process, 306 horses were given the go ahead to start the race on Tuesday morning at 07:00am...

Read more here:
https://endurance-world.com/cold-temperatures-didnt-interfere-successful-fauresmith-2019/

France: Inaugural international races in Fougères

Endurance-world.com - Full Article

12th July 2019
Race Report made with the assistance of Antoine Helleux

Fougères, Brittany, France. Saturday 29 June 2019. It was the first time the association Cheval Endurance Fougeraise organised a CEI1* and CEI2*.

38 riders took off for the CEI2* 120km and another 39 riders for the CEI1* 90km ride. Due to the heat wave in France (35°C at the maximum) and in order to protect the horses, the ground jury and veterinary team decided to change the heart rate and speed rules. The maximum heart rate to enter the vet gate was decreased to 60 in 15 minutes, the minimal speed was lowered to 11 km/h.
The track ran for partly through the forest and on the little hill around Fougères.

First vet check was located in the place of « Rocher Portail » 15 km of Fougères. After the first 35km only six horses were stopped thanks to good management of the riders, and limited speed of only 15 km/h...

Read more here:
https://endurance-world.com/inaugural-international-races-in-fougeres/

Australia: Kaylea Mahera Takes Out 2019 Tom Quilty Gold Cup

TomQuilty2019.com.au - Full Article and Partial Results

Local endurance rider Kaylea Maher got to fulfil her dream of holding up the most coveted prize in the sport of endurance ― the Tom Quilty Gold Cup ― when she crossed the line ahead of 298 other riders from across Australia and abroad in the iconic 160km endurance race.

Kaylea completed the ride, which was hosted at the Stirling’s Crossing Equestrian Complex in Imbil Queensland, in ten hours and eight minutes after setting off on the ultimate endurance challenge at midnight last night.

She said she was hopeful of taking out the win but there were many factors that influenced the end result.

“Every ride you just take as it comes as you never know what the end result is going to be,” said Kaylea.

“You always have to have hope in your horse and believe in your horse and that’s what we did today. We believed in each other and we worked through all our challenges and he came home really strong. I’m really happy with his achievement today.”

“Credit goes to the people at home in our stable, they do a fantastic job of looking after him and yes, it’s a lot of hours and a lot of time; a lot of tears and sweat that go into getting a horse to the condition they need to be in to perform on the day. And that’s what we’ve seen, the hard work’s definitely paid off and I want to thank everyone who’s helped me get there today.

“It doesn’t matter if you’re at home or away, the competition is still there but to actually pull it off on home ground with the support from all my family, my friends and my team, I guess that’s where it comes down to feeling good about having this win on home ground.”

Kaylea also gave credit to her horse, Matta Mia Dimari, a locally bred Arabian with a feisty spirit.

“The first time I saw this horse I had a connection with him and I always believed from the first time I rode him that he could take home the Gold Cup,” said Kaylea.

“I worked with him from day one on our farm and I had the goal set in my mind that I was going to work towards getting him ready for this 2019 Tom Quilty Gold Cup...”

Read more here:
https://www.tomquilty2019.com.au/tom-quilty-gold-cup-2019-results/

Australia: Taroom's Sally Conway one of 45 entrants in 2019 Mongol Derby

Queenslandcountrylife.com.au - Full Article

Sally Cripps
12 Jul 2019,

A year ago Taroom's Sally Conway was full of dreams of riding in the Mongol Derby and raising awareness of mental health in rural Australia - in another few week's time it won't be a dream but reality.

The 22-year-old is one of six Queenslanders in a pack of 45 competitors from around the world that will be on the ride of their life in the 11th annual Mongol Derby starting on August 7.

Sally had originally planned to take on the world's longest and toughest horse ride last year but realised she needed time to both do a good job of the ride and to honour her desire to make a difference with a suicide awareness message, so she postponed.

She was also in year three of a farm business management degree.

Now she says she's ready for the Mongolian adventure and has a great plan in place to help a cause close to herself and others...

Read more here:
https://www.queenslandcountrylife.com.au/story/6271674/sal-saddles-up-for-mongol-derby/

Middleburg woman trains to compete in Mongol Derby

News4jax.com - Full Story

The Mongol Derby is one of the most difficult horse races in the world

By Jamal St. Cyr - Sports anchor & reporter
Posted: 4:01 PM, July 09, 2019

JACKSONVILLE, Fla - A local woman is going to compete in one of the most difficult horse races in the world.

Abbi Bell is a Middleburg resident and has been riding since she was 5. But she’s never attempted anything like the Mongol Derby.

Now, she is preparing to take on the race in Mongolia that recreates Genghis Khan's mail postal system routes.

Bell says that "He was the first to have an official mail route. They could move letters from point A to point B in messages in absolutely no time. The race recreates it with a different route every year just to keep it changed up."

Riders will ride for 13 hours a day for up to 10 days...

Read more here:
https://www.news4jax.com/sports/local-woman-trains-to-compete-in-mongol-derby