RIDER PROFILES

We first met junior event rider Gina in 2006, when she won our competition in British Eventing magazine, for a lesson with Irish eventer Mark Kyle and some Baileys to keep her pony, Ice Cool Bailey, well fed with his favourite All-Round Endurance Mix. Although Gina has been riding since she was three years old, she says she did not start riding ‘properly’ until she was seven. A member of her local Pony Club, Gina started competing and went on to ride for her club and hasn’t looked back since. Still only 15, she has already worked hard to gain experience at Pony Club Championships and, last year the hard work has paid off when Gina was selected to ride at Freudenberg in Germany as part of the British squad at the pony European Eventing Championships where they carried off team gold!

 

The support of her parents is invaluable, says Gina, as is the help from her trainer, Judy Bradwall, and sponsors, Baileys. With ambitions to reach the top in eventing Gina knows she has a long way to go and is realistic about the amount of hard work involved and the highs and lows she will have to go through to get there.   In 2006 Gina and Bailey finished 5^th in the British Pre-Novice Championships at Aston-Le-Walls – a brilliant but frustrating placing as she added four time penalties from the cross country, after going too quick, to her dressage score and just missed out on the top spot! They made up for it in their last run of the season though, finishing second in the pony two star at Ballindenisk.

 

With a yard full of greys, Gina tells us the one thing she couldn’t live without would be shampoo! Her fondness for greys could also be the reason why she names the Kyle’s Drunken Disorderly and Bettina Hoy’s Ringwood Cockatoo as horses she would love to have – though perhaps it’s just because they’re great horses!    Gina is looking forward riding on the Derby House European Pony Team again this year in Switzerland after being crowned National Pony Champion at Chepstow.  With a lot to look forward to she is also bringing on a couple of new horses, which she hopes will help her make the transition from ponies and keep her on track to fulfil her dreams of becoming a professional eventer.

 
Find out here more about Gina and Bailey at the 2007 Pony European Championships in Freudenberg in Germany.