Social Rider Kara Alexander joined the club last year after a seven year break from horse-riding.
"The reason why I joined the UCLan Equestrian team was because I wanted to get back into riding after being out of the saddle for around a while. What I wanted to get out of joining the club was to gain my confidence back after a bad fall, and prove to myself that I could get back on a horse and still enjoy riding as much as I did when I was younger. The club met my expectations as it is a club where everyone loves horses, and even though everyone is at a different level of horse riding, they all encourage one another. Making friends in the club was easy as everyone was so friendly and helpful. Two key moments from last year were when I cantered for the first time in seven years, as I never thought I would have the courage to do it. The other key moment is coming first in the pre-novice dressage and jumping, at the social rider competition as I never thought I would compete let alone come first."
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There are so many great reasons to join a club or society whilst at uni – and helpfully UCLan came up with 10 of them right here.
But if you wanna take that to the next level, why not join a team? UCLan Equestrian Club has four teams, Championship and Trophy, competing at BUCS level and the development teams Ribbon and Rosette. Social Sec Lauren Fitzpatrick joined the club last year, earning herself a place on Rosette team after 14 years on horseback. Despite pre-comp jitters, Lauren always has a blast with her team mates: “Horse riding doesn’t always feel like a team sport, but the Rosette girls did make it feel like a team. Coming back from a comp, whether we’d won or lost we had a great celebration on the way home.” Said Lauren. It’s also diversified Lauren’s experience as a rider: “It allowed us to get ideas from different clubs, and make new friends. It also gave me the chance to ride different horses.” She said. BUCS Officer Callum also joined us last year and claimed a spot on Trophy team after around 13 years riding: “On assessment day we were tested on both dressage and jumping in a short test to demonstrate our capabilities. “Being on team helps to get to know people and support and progress your riding through a team. Getting rosettes is nice but secondary to going places with friends to ride new horses!” Said Callum. One of our beloved former club, team, and committee members, Nicole Benson has been representing the club her whole three years at uni, starting in C team and working her way up to A team. After riding for 16 years and competing in local shows at home, Nicole says she didn’t wanna miss out on that opportunity when moving away to uni. It’s also a matter of ambition for Nicole: “Going for teams in UCLan Equestrian always gave me something to work and improve towards.” As well as this, nothing beats the bond created between a team: “Having a smaller support group like that really made everything easier because, despite the whole club being an amazing place of support, having a team that’s going through the same thing really strengthens your friendships. “It’s an important way of looking up to people, if you’re a beginner, of if you had a skill you wanted to improve on. Even when I was in a team, I still looked up to other team members.” Nicole said. If you’re interested in trying out for teams, this year’s assessment day will be taking place towards the end of September/ beginning of October, so like our Facebook page facebook.com/uclanequestrian to keep up to date! UCLAN Equestrian club members Sarah Pearson, Sophie Bulloch and Sinead Airey visited the RDA regionals in Cheshire in May. The club agreed to sponser the regional event after having had a close connection with the charity for two years now, looking to continue in the future. Through various fundraising events, the club have raised over £1200 and volunteered countless hours. So when offered the chance to sponser the regionals event, the club jumped at the chance, and even went along on the day to help out with judging, and the presentations. The girls had a great day, and great weather to go along with it. The second annual Uclan Equestrian Social Rider Competition took place on Wednesday March 22.
The comp took place in the team’s home of Moorview Equestrian centre in Darwen. Organised by Team Captain Jade Cannon, the day ran extremely smoothly, even if the weather did not. Jade expressed her appreciation of the team at Moorview, both of the Vickis' for teaching club members each week, the judges, Ben and Charlotte, and Pat for making her famous cakes. Social Rider Representative Laura Parry said: “Great fun was had by all and it was lovely to see how everyone had improved over the last year, especially how much the beginners had come along in a short time.” Trophy team member, and next year’s BUCS officer, Callum Small also helped ensure the day ran smoothly. He said: “It was nice to see so many people being so enthusiastic to compete and show off what they’ve achieved over the year. “Everybody did really well and I’m looking forward to more next year.” With four classes to choose from; Advanced, Intermediate, Novice, and Pre-Novice, this year’s social riders were given the opportunity to showcase their skills at dressage and jumping. The winners of each class are as follows: Advanced Dressage: Robert Greggor on Toby Organiser Jade Cannon commented on Robert’s test, calling it, “Amazing to watch, accurate, rhythmical and in total harmony with Toby. I know I am not the only one who felt inspired watching him!” Said Jade. Robert is registered blind, and relies on counting strides to make his turns accurate. Robert expressed his gratefulness to the orgnisers for putting on such a great show and said, “Because of the system that BUCS uses, I don’t manage to compete for the university team. “Being able to join in with a friendly competition on home turf really meant a lot.” Advanced Jumping: Treasurer Sarah Pearson on Mouse The smallest combination in the competition, Sarah and Mouse flew around their jump course with no problems. Intermediate Dressage: Alice Dachtler-Wood on George Despite their love hate relationship, Alice and George proved to be a formidable pair on the dressage circuit. A first year member, who had taken some time away from riding, Alice scored a victory in the largest class of the day. Alice was overjoyed with the result, saying: “I really challenged myself, and clearly it payed off!” Intermediate Jumping: Rebecca McJarrow on Shamrock Last year’s social rider of the year, Becky once again made good this year with a first place jumping result on Shamrock. Over the year Becky has been taking advantage of the UCLan Equestrian social rider scholarship, having extra lunge lessons and jumping practise. Novice Dressage: Laura Creighton on George Another fresher to the club, Laura C took first place on the novice dressage test. “It’s a really nice confidence boost, but I’m really proud of all the beginners this year as we’ve all come so far.” She said. Pre-Novice Dressage: Kara Alexander-Lench on Diana Fresher Kara rode Diana to first place in the Pre-Novice dressage. Kara was impressed with the smooth running of the day, and said it really helped her confidence. She said: “I was really please with my performance as I came away with a first and a second. Can’t wait for next year’s social rider comp!” Pre-Novice Jumping: Laura Creighton on George George once again proved why he is the pony favourite of the yard, with his third victory of the day, raking in the rosettes for Alice and Laura. Novice/Pre-Novice was the only class to have an overall winner, which was awarded to Laura Creighton. There were other awards given out on the day including Tack and Turnout which went to Maddie Naidoo on Pepper, with Georgia Sims and Dolly taking the reserve. Overall Champion of the day, awarded to Georgia Sims, with Sarah Pearson taking the reserve spot. On her win to Champion, Georgia said: “I’m shocked I won it to be honest, I definitely wasn’t expecting it and it was a nice surprise.” Social Rider of the Year which went to final year student Bethany Holden, on Melissa. Beth said, “I felt honoured to be given the award, and I’m so grateful to the Equestrian club for supporting me through learning to ride.” The UCLan Equestrian team hosted its first competition of the year at the wonderful Moorview Equestrian Centre last Wednesday for the Trophy Team (UCLan2). The Trophy team had an incredibly successful year last year and are looking to repeat their accomplishment at regionals with a strong performance again this season. This year the team consists of new equestrian club members Beth Nuttall and Callum Small; Beth is a first year studying Film & Media Studies and Callum is in his 3rd year studying Robotic Engineering. Although new to the club, they are both incredibly experienced having had horses all their lives and competed across a range of disciplines. Completing the team are 2 ‘oldies’; Lucy Cooper, 3rd year Psychology, who has now been on every team in the club from development to Championship! And Jade Cannon who is captain this year and the only remaining member of the Trophy team from last year. Excitingly Trophy team is against the same universities as they were last year; which means there are a lot of familiar faces! In the league is Bishop Burton, Leeds and Newcastle however, Leeds were sadly unable to make the first competition. Despite the extremely adverse weather all teams and our judge arrived in good time and were in high spirits for the competition. Even though the UCLan team had worked extra hard preparing for the competition; horse substitutions for the dressage section meant that both Beth and Lucy were riding horses they had never sat on before! The dressage began with Jade riding first for the team on Lottie, a coloured mare with a sassy attitude and a penchant for the odd buck ;). They performed well, just struggling with the left canter lead. Callum and the thoroughbred Jazz were second to go; delivering a strong test, with Callum highlighting some areas for improvement- “our trot work was good, nice and relaxed however the canter could have been better.” Third up was Beth on Splash, a horse she had never seen on the yard, never mind ridden! She had watched others before her and had a positive plan in place to ensure some correct leads in the canter and some more expression in the medium trot. Her plan paid off with a lovely correct test, that was extremely relaxed yet accurate. Lucy was last to go on Pride; a horse with which she immediately clicked, despite not having ridden in the run up to the competition. They delivered a superb test, with Pride showing off her lovely paces and the pair were in harmony throughout. The team were very happy with their performances in the dressage; however, the other teams had also produced some excellent tests so it was a nerve wracking wait for the results of the first phase. While waiting for the scores for the dressage the whole club erupted into action; with members cooling off, unplaiting and putting dressage horses to bed, preparing the horses for the jumping phase and putting away the dressage arena and setting up the jumping course. Everything was done in super quick time due to assistance from every club member and the visiting teams. Then the dressage results were in… UCLan in 1st spot with a 38-point lead!! An excellent start to the day that left it all to play for in the jumping section. The course was set; designed by Beth Nuttall, the team knew that although not at max height, the course was technically testing with the final fence being a tough skinny going away from the collecting ring. First to go in the jumping was Lucy on Romany; a lovely little cob who was making her jumping competition debut for the club. Romany can be strong and get a little flat at times, but Lucy kept her in a forward rhythm but keeping in balance, it was looking like a winning round. until the last fence, the skinny… Romany hadn’t been keen in the show off but because Lucy had settled her so well she had decided to jump it from a canter, unfortunately it didn’t pay off. Although Lucy finished her round disappointed with 2 run outs at the last fence, she didn’t let that show – immediately giving feedback to the rest of the team about how the course had felt and what we should look out for. Beth and Pepper were next; a combination that had struggled to ‘gel’ in practices, with Pepper being a very forward mare and Beth having an electric bum! Beth summarises “I was a bit anxious about my jump round as Pepper and I had a disagreement during the warmup. However, we both took a little time to relax and settle down in the actual round to jump a lovely clear.” Callum was drawn 3rd on Dolly; a pro at the jumping competitions by now... however not the easiest horse who will have a sneaky run out if the rider switches off. Callum jumped a brilliant clear round; although did panic Jade (Captain) at the last fence when Dolly did a ‘wiggle’ on the way in!!! Last to go and feeling the pressure was Jade the captain on Toby. Although Toby is relatively straightforward and had jumped his rounds so far with relative ease Jade was still apprehensive that he can be a little monkey at times and the team couldn’t afford anything less than a clear round for the chance to stay in first place! Jade managed to hold the nerves at bay and jump a positive clear round, with Toby getting a big hug at the end! It was then a nerve wracking wait; had the team done enough to stay ahead of the other universities. All the riders had ridden the horses excellently and it was anyone’s guess who would be the eventual winners. The UCLan team all agreed that every member had done their absolute best on the horse they had been given and that is all that can be asked. Finally, it was time to announce the final scores; individuals first, in reverse order …. 8th place went to Hazel Cozens (Newcastle) In 7th place was Callum Small (UCLan) 6th place was Isabel Taylor (Newcastle) Gemma Gurr took 5th place (Bishop Burton) 4th place went to Rachel Browne (Newcastle) Beth Nuttall took the 3rd place slot (UCLan) 2nd place was Abigail Hope (Bishop Burton) And finally, 1st place was Jade Cannon (UCLan) The team were thrilled with individuals doing so well; however, the important bit is the team placings and even with UCLan having 3 riders in the top 8, it can still be a close call. In 3rd place was Newcastle… In second place were ………………………. Bishop Burton – meaning UCLan had hung on to their first place and won their first competition of the season! The whole team and club were thrilled with the result; especially as Lucy and Beth hadn’t ridden their dressage horses before and we had a new, and unknown to us, judge (Sue Stewart) who had judged at the Championship Nationals last year … giving a good idea of what the team need to work on. The Trophy team could not have done it without the amazing support from Moorview Equestrian Centre; not only in the time, energy, facilities and horses provided to the club by the team at Moorview, but also very generously through sponsorship, which has enabled the team to have extra training sessions and be fully prepared for what we hope to be another successful competition season! Finally, a huge thankyou goes to the rest of the UCLan Equestrian Club – competitions simply could not run without them. We are extremely lucky to have such a wonderful bunch of members that took a day off studying hard … to get up in the early hours of the morning, plait ponies, set up arenas, muck out stables, sweep the yard and generally be lovely and supportive to everyone competing. Next up is Championship team away at Lancaster on 30th November…. let’s hope the successful streak can continue!!!
Hi my name is Sophie and I am a second year law student at Uclan. I transferred from the University of Derby to continue my studies. During my first year I never got involved with any clubs as I was always too sceptical that I wouldn’t be good enough and with the transition to university and everything else it would have been adding pressure. When I came to Uclan I decided to take a different look on life and to step out of my comfort zone and take part in something I have a passion for, HORSERIDING! I have been riding since the age of 5 and I got my first horse Rio when I was 11. I took part in pony club, local shows, private lessons etc. which built my confidence up immensely. I always find horse riding a relaxing and exciting hobby one which allows me to have that break from my studies. Upon joining the society, I was very nervous as I wanted to make friends and hope that I was good enough, I decided to book on the assessment day to give myself the chance to show that I am good enough. I was so very nervous on the day, but I knew that no matter what happened I would still have been supported. Whilst waiting for my assessment I was speaking to people (both old and new members), those of which shared the same interest as me and enjoyed talking about horsey things! Something I didn’t have with other friends. We just clicked instantly and it was so easy and natural to have conversations and exchange our experiences. What really sold the club to me is that they’re not just a group of people who like horse-riding, they are a group of friends who support and encourage each other to improve themselves in their riding ability and strengthening their friendships, after all you’re a team! I completed my assessment and I was very proud of myself, I love how supportive all the girls are making the club all the more exciting. The 5th October I went to the first social held by the Equestrian girls which was cowboys and Indians themed designed to bring all the new members and old members together which are fun and well organised. It was honestly one of the best nights out I’ve had whilst in Preston. As I said before it’s not just a group of girls, they are friends who party together and ride together and to me that is something I’ve never been part of before. Everyone on the team is a brilliant rider and I am so very lucky to have made the team for this year and I look forward to riding with everyone. My advice to anyone who wants to join the Equine team, DO IT! You will not regret it! Even if you don’t make the riding team you are still valued and it is an experience that I, personally will never regret! - Sophie, Competive Rider Wednesday 28th September saw the UCLan Equestrian team's 2nd Annual Give it A Go session! With an incredible 25 new riders booked on, the team were looking forward to a busy yet fun filled day of horses and socialising.
At 1:45pm the minibus full of the first load of beginners poured in to the yard, smiles on their faces and the feel of excitement mixed with apprehension filled the atmosphere. As the club welcomed the potential new members to the yard, we began organising the groups and ushered the first set of riders towards to arena while the horses were getting ready inside. The remainder of the group being taken on a tour of the stables and ponies within. The first group began their introduction to Horse Riding, with our instructor Vicki taking full control of the fun and learning taking place. With the leaders take their places by the horses, the ride began heading forward on their first walk around. All the newcomers were all extremely happy and had continuous grins plastered to their faces - eager to learn more about the Equestrian world. Going in to their first trot on their appointed horses, a slight wave of nerves filled the arena but as soon as they set off trotting, that soon left and the glee returned. The onlookers for the next group to ride whispering in excitement to take their turn on the glorious horses that we as a club have the opportunity to ride all year long! Thankfully, this continued throughout the whole day and ran smoothly for the entire afternoon. The cycle of riding, having a tour and watching kept the beginners on their toes, cuddling the ponies and eating the homemade cake provided by one of our amazing yard team, Pat. By the end of the lessons, everyone regrouped to watch our team captains; Leonie Holicki and Jade Cannon, riding a dressage and showjumping demonstration on their chosen horses Jazz and Pepper. With claps echoing in the arena as our captains rode around, the current club and committee members looked entirely satisfied and pleased with how the day had gone after weeks of planning and organising. The look and happiness and relief after realising how much fun had been had and the potential amount of newcomers they might have wanting to join our club was beyond amazing! As the day came to an end and the GIAG riders started to pile back on the buses, the chatter between the riders came positively from everyone involved with many questions being asked to current and returning members of what to expect for the rest of the year! - Nicole (Photography by Ellie Louise Photography) (Today 5 of our members (Nixon, Sarah, Amelia, Holly and Laura) went to visit one of our local riding schools - Wrea Green Equitation Centre - which holds lessons for the Riding for the Disabled Associations (RDA) group 'Seaside Venture'. These lessons are made up of people of all ages, gender, abilities and disabilities. Our reason behind it? We're going to volunteer!
Although we hold a large amount of events to raise money to give to the RDA NW, we have decided that this year, as well as giving money, we are going to also give our time! The RDA is an association close to our hearts here at UCLan Equestrian so we wanted to give as much as we could. Every Tuesday we will be sending up students to help lead and sidewalk in their lessons as well as do anything we can to help out around the yard. While at the yard we met the instructors and those behind the center, the riders and plenty of parents who were all eager to have more volunteers helping out! Obviously while we were there we had a wander and met all of the adorable horses and ponies, with a few members falling in love with a couple of horses in particular! Hopefully if everything goes to plan we can start volunteering up there next week, and we just can't wait to get stuck in! |
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Laura Creighton: Media Officer Archives
September 2017
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