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Competition winner's lesson with Hannah Esberger-Shepherd

4th June 2009

The winner of our recent competition in Your Horse magazine won a lesson with champion dressage rider Hannah Esberger-Shepherd. The winner was Siobhain, but she decided to let her friend Kath take the lesson, while she went along and watched from the side. Siobhain still gained a lot from this experience even though she was not riding, as she was able to listen to Hannah’s expert advice to Kath.

The lesson took place on Tuesday 19th May 2009 and the weather was a mixture of sunshine and showers. Siobhain and Kath arrived at Hannah’s stables on the outskirts of Sheffield, with Kath’s horse Mickey who travelled well and soon settled.
Hannah’s family has been very busy renovating, and have brand new huge stables, making a perfect setting for a top class lesson.

Hannah started riding at 8.30 am and watching her was a treat, as she made it look so easy! Kath gained a lot from the lesson, with Hannah talking to her through a walkie talkie system so that she could watch Kath and Mickey from afar, and be able to give instant feed back straight to Kath’s ear.

In addition to Hannah, her father Robert, Siobhain, Anne Priestman Dengie’s Northern Regional Sales Manager all watched from the comfort of a shelter at the end of the arena. Hannah’s arena also had mirrors which really helped Kath with visualising what she was doing.

Whilst Kath was having her lesson with Hannah, Siobhain told us some impressive facts about Kath. Kath was the first lady to ride in a gun team in the King's Troop. Actually she is pretty amazing at whatever she turns her hand to, such as the Chase me Charlie she did on an 11.3hh jumping 4' 7 and beating all the horses, or winning the local Longnor Wakes pony races for ten years. Currently she is running competitively and doing very well at it! In the current climate her eventing career has had to be put on the back burner, although she did have an unaffiliated run recently.

In addition to the lesson, Siobhain also won a year’s supply of Dengie horse feeds and as an avid Dengie feeds fan she will already be putting this to good use.

Siobhain really enjoyed her day and e-mailed us to say;

“I have decided now from watching Hannah that I will start learning to ride again from scratch. I have been "riding" for 27 years but learned more in that hour about riding than I have learned previously. To watch her both riding and teaching was a really enlightening time. Kath got an awful lot out of the lesson too and has approached Hannah about the possibility of further lessons.”

“Thank you once again for organising the competition prize. I now have Loreley, my 15 year old purebred Cleveland Bay mare on your Alfa-A Balancer and Alfa-Beet, Fleur my 2 year old purebred Cleveland Bay filly on Alfa-A and Fibremix Complement and Joseph, my husband's 16 year old Clydesdale cross on Hi-Fi Lite and Natural Vitality Leisure Vits and Mins. They all seem to be doing very well on them.”

“I really wish Hannah all the success in the world. I shall be following her news and successes from now on”

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