Horses from the North win Awards Down South

from Jennifer Cranford

Isabella Worthington and Basingwerk Dream Works

The Horse Trust is ramping up their Healthy Body Condition Awards with many Showing Shows signing up to be ‘Weight-Aware’. This recently included The RIHS at Hickstead on the last week of July.

These coveted awards recognise and reward horses and ponies in the best condition as well as providing support and advice. The British Equine Veterinary Association considers equine obesity to be one of the most serious risks to equines today.

The Awards were given in over 20 Classes and over 400 horses were body conditioned scored by our qualified experts: Tamzin Furtado PhD, Alison Talbot MRCVS and Dee Pollard from the British Horse Society.

We had winners from across the country; from Devon to Orkney at the top of Scotland, but not quite as Northerly as this were quite a few winners who travelled from the North of England.

Class 180 The BSPS Heritage M&M Open Ridden Dartmoor, Exmoor,

Shetlands. Springwater Angus, 8 year old owned by Julie Templeton and exhibited by Jennifer Cowan. Julie Templeton is on the Ponies UK Showing Council and is a keen advocate of the “Weight Aware” Programme. “Angus is relatively easy to keep fit and at a healthy weight because he’s a scopey Dartmoor pony. He’s ridden most days and in the winter is un-rugged and allowed to ‘reset’ his condition.” Not placed in this busy class of 29 entrants but they are “very happy to receive the award because health and welfare is the most important thing”. They’ve travelled from the Shropshire/Lancashire borders for the Royal International Horse Show at Hickstead.

Class 180 Springwater Angus © Equinational

Class 187 Heritage M&M First Ridden From The Wirral, Carrwood Valentine, owned by Gabby and Barbara Sturton, ridden by Brogan Douglas-Jones won the Award. 16 years old, chestnut, lives at home with owners, Gabbie and Barbara Sturton, he is currently on loan to Brogan. “He does a bit www.lancmag.com

of everything; lots of hacking. He is kept on a bare paddock, we watch his weight and he’s out at night with other ponies. We are careful as we see so many ponies that get laminitis. When you are coming to the RIHS and know the judges don’t want to see big fat pads, we try to have him at the right weight.” Grandmother added “that’s why we are really delighted to win this award; he smiles a lot and is very well loved”.

Class 201 Large Riding Horse

Championship saw Hoghton Maveric, stable name William, ridden by Freyer Metters win the Award for having the Healthiest Body Condition. They travelled down from Preston, Lancashire with Hoghton D’Abruzzo who also won the same award in Class 238 The Small Hunter Championship. “William is only 5 year old, a really good doer, doesn’t get anything special to eat, he goes out every day, we do quite a bit of dressage and it is just about producing him the right way. Our ambitions for William are to keep going get better, he’s talented in dressage and gives the most beautiful ride. These Body Condition Awards are really nice, definitely a positive step, I am technically professional, but the owners love to do him from home, and we try really hard to do everything in the right way so it is really nice to be rewarded.”

As aforementioned, Hoghton D’Abbruzzo, Arthur, also took home a green and gold rosette from The Horse Trust. He’s a 7 year old grey by Power Blade out of Hoghton Solitaire, owned by Raine Harthern and was ridden by Alice Pimbley. He does mainly showing in summer, hunts all winter with Holcombe Harriers, where “he was excellent and we jumped some really good stuff!”. Arthur lives out 24/7, just enough feed, not much hard feed and plenty of hacking. “We

Class 209 Penlangrug One Direction © Equinational don’t go in the school at all; just fun rides, cross-country… he loves the life and we don’t have to work that hard at keeping his weight steady, it is just the work. If he is dropping a bit of weight he will have an easy week, he will probably have an easy week now, then we have a HOYS qualifier in midAugust. We don’t do a lot with him, we don’t need to, he is still young and he is such a good boy. We’ve only done one HOYS qualifier; it’s the first season so don’t want to sicken him. We will do Ashbourne and see how it goes! Arthur is such a character, he has to carry something in his mouth, rugs, brushes - if you leave a brush outside his stable he will sweep with it. He is just a joy!”

Owner, Raine Harthern is really proud of getting the Award in both classes. “We really don’t like fat horses, Arthur hunted last season and he is hoping to hunt this season, and we just can’t have fat horses. It’s not good for him. We want him to have a nice topline but not big fat bottoms! He likes splashing in water treadmill, and being ridden on the beach at Lytham St Annes. He took all this in his stride.”

Class 209 NPS M&M over 143cm Working Hunter Pony The Horse Trust’s Award went to Penlangrug One Direction, owned by Karen Raine and ridden by Rebecca Raine. He is kept at home in Preston, Lancashire; they’ve had him 9 months… “He found us, we’ve known him since he was a baby and nowadays this is all

Class 228 Bluebarn Beharry © Equinational

we do with him - he has done some Pony Club, but he has never jumped at this level. So to then go and jump clear, we are absolutely over the moon! He is still green at this level although he’s 10 years old but we lost so much time due to covid and he had a year turned away. We aim to qualify for HOYS and other Finals. We were here last year so knew the Programme and we think it’s a good idea as there is a need to cut down on overweight horses. For years it’s been incorrectly accepted that show horses should be fat; to go round here they need to be fit!”.

Class 228 BSPS Heritage M&M Pretty Polly First Ridden Pony Championship Our Postdoctoral Research Associate at University of Liverpool, Tamzin Furtado identified a few ponies with a reasonably good body condition in this Class. “Ideally we’d like to see a body score of 3, however there were several at 3.5 which is great to see but there’s still room for improvement.” Some of the ponies with this score had already been awarded the coveted green and gold rosette at other shows and were still in a good condition. Our winner today, from Lancashire, was an Exmoor pony called Bluebarn Beharry, owned by Stephanie Sharp and ridden by Maisie Sharp. Tamzin recognises that Exmoor ponies are often really good doers and not the easiest to keep the weight off of. We caught up with Bluebarn Beharry’s owner Stephanie Sharpe who had heard of the Awards before and witnessed their presence at the Great Yorkshire Show and think the idea of the Awards is a good thing. Harry is kept at restricted grass and gets a feed balancer; he does lots of long hacks with today’s rider Maisie who at 11 is having her last contest of this class. We hope they feel it was worth the long drive; placed 8th in this Class out of 27 but won The Healthiest Body Condition!

The RIHS has supported the programme since 2019, and is pleased to raise the profile for the awards at this year’s event. David Ingle, Director of Showing at the Royal International Horse Show, Hickstead and former Chairman of The Showing Council, said, “Showing is keen to become more educational and we are in an era of great improvement in equine welfare, with increasing scrutiny under social license. This initiative shines a light on this important aspect of showing. We will be making this award in more classes and highlighting the importance of correct weight to competitors at the RIHS this year”, said David.

What is The Weigh To Win Initiative?

The Horse Trust’s programme is an important initiative to reward healthy equine body condition and raise awareness of healthy body condition in show horses. Showing in particular is often seen to promote horses that are overweight and the aim is to challenge and educate on what is an ideal body condition.

The Healthy Equine Body Condition Awards are presented at events throughout the showing season providing friendly, supportive advice and guidance to owners, riders and producers, both at the events and during online training sessions and webinars.

Jan Rogers, Head of Research and Policy at The Horse Trust, says, “We get very upset by seeing photos of underweight horses in the media, but in reality, far more horses are obese than are underweight. This is worrying for vets who are finding that they have to treat these horses with serious health conditions like Equine Metabolic Syndrome and Laminitis. Peoples’ perceptions of what is a healthy weight have shifted towards the higher body condition scores. We would like to help to reset this balance.” For further information about the Programme visit: horsetrust.org.uk