Two teams from Bedale and West of Yore Pony Club won at the Pony Club National Novice Championships held at Kelsall Hill in Cheshire over August Bank Holiday weekend.

Firstly the Novice Show Jumping Team, consisting of Grace Lumley riding Blue Brook, Harry Carlisle riding Youve Been Mangoed, Sophie Riggs riding Daffney and Claudia Hill riding Little Hill Merlin won on Saturday after a very exciting jump off against six other teams.  With two teams managing to achieve three clear rounds it was all down to the fastest times, which went in BWY's favour by less than one second!  The successful team had already won their regional qualifier against 50 northern teams and with over 40 teams competing on the day, some travelling from as far afield as Ireland, this was a fantastic achievement.

On Sunday BWY had two teams represented in the Novice Eventing.  This was a long day which involved dressage, show jumping and cross country jumping over a tough course, which was not helped by torrential rain making the courses very tricky.  Due to a particularly superb dressage test from Charlotte Saxby riding Wurzell, and outstanding performances from her team mates Olivia Stones riding Pop Corn, Helena France riding Dot Com and Grace Lumley once again on Blue Brook, the BWY Red team were run away winners with a combined score of 88.8. 

The BWY Blue team consisting of Storm Straker riding Black September, Harry Carlisle riding Youve Been Mangoed,  Katie Fall riding Budlight and Sophie Riggs on Daffney, were also on good form and were joint second with a combined score of 102.4, but were place third behind Middleton East who were closer to the optimum time over the cross country course.

The Northern Regional eventing qualifier was held in July at Newfield nr Mickley by kind permission of the Abrahams family.   Chief Instructor of the Bedale and West of Yore Pony Club, Robert Blane said, "We would like to thank the Abrahams family and British Horse Feeds our main sponsor of the Newfield event.  One of the main reasons our teams have performed so well is down to the success of this event and the encouragement they get from competing there.  BWY have never before won at the Novice Championships, so we are delighted with this achievement, it is all down to the children's hard work and dedication.  Well done, they are now national champions."

To round off the weekend there were individual placings for Daisy Vivian in the dressage, and Sophie Riggs, Charlotte Saxby, Storm Straker and Olivia Stones in the eventing.  Particular mention should be made of Katie Fall who was called up at the last minute to fill the space unfortunately vacated by Alice Hodgson who's horse Dublin went lame 24 hours before the event.

At the Polo Championships, our Branch Team of Angus Johnston, D'Arcy Rainford-Blackett, Ellie Tempest and a pool player from Cotswold PCcalled Toby Edmondson were narrowly beaten in the Loriner Final - well done to you too!