Badminton 2018 - Round-up

​The beginning of May saw our busiest and most exciting time of year, Badminton Horse Trials.  After a very challenging start to the 2018 eventing season with many cancellations it was great to be at the biggest and best 4* event in the world and also enjoy some bright sunshine.

As always the Horse Trials Support Group had our members marquee just a stone’s throw from the main arena, offering members a great place to meet friends, watch the action on screens, enjoy good quality food and attend several events put on by the Committee. 
​
197 members took up their Badminton passes this year which represents the majority of our membership – it was wonderful to greet so many of you in the marquee.

We hosted a number of events throughout the four days of the event which included:

• Afternoon tea on the Thursday with a very interesting first day dressage review from Peter Storr, former British National Dressage Champion.
• Informative cross country course walks on the Thursday and Saturday with Ginny Elliott, and Spencer Sturmey. We were honoured to have been joined by Lorna Clarke for the course walk on the Thursday. HTSG members were joined by some lucky British Eventing prize winners on the Saturday, along with a group of students from Haddon Training.​

• Yogi Breisner, former World Class Performance Manager also took a group of members around the course and was welcomed in the marquee throughout the event.
• On the Friday evening nearly 100 members and guests attended the cross country preview evening. The panel was made up of Ginny Elliot, Tina Cook and our two scholars, Laura Collett and Alex Bragg. We were delighted to welcome Eric Winter, Course Designer, to the marquee, and he provided a really interesting insight into his thoughts when designing the toughest cross country course in the world.

Photos © Fiona Scott-Maxwell

• On Saturday during our pre-cross country breakfast we were joined by the fascinating Diarm Byrne of EquiRatings who talked us through the stats from dressage and gave us some predictions for the cross country.

• Finally, on Sunday we conducted our raffle prize draw – there were some amazing prizes donated.  Many thanks to Dodson & Horrell, Holland Cooper, Fairfax & Favor, Timothy Foxx Clothing, KM Elite Products, Point Two Air Jackets, Burghley Horse Trials, Blenheim Palace Horse Trials, Barbury International Horse Trials, Mojowristbands.co.uk, HiHo Silver, Annabel Brocks, Sederholm, Pol Roger, British Eventing Official, English Tweed & Patchwork Co.

Laura Collett with the many prizes from our raffle

We would like to thank our members and guests for their generous support at these events over the four days. ​​

Read how Scholar Alex Bragg faired at Badminton 2018

View photos taken by HTSG Committee Member Michael Rogers