Whilst we love celebrating our riders’ achievements, we couldn’t let 2019 disappear out of view without acknowledging the incredible season our mentor Pippa Funnell had.
Perhaps the most incredible of all of her 2019 accolades was adding a 2nd Land Rover Burghley Horse Trials trophy to her cabinet 14 years after her first! Following a plethora of incredible National and International results (below) with her amazing string of talented Event Horses, Pippa headed to the Stamford Estate at the beginning of September with both MGH Grafton Street and Billy Walk On.
Leading from the front on a dressage score of 22.8, Pippa and Squirell (MGH Grafton Street) added just 4 time and 4 show jumping penalties to their first phase score to take the win and the place went wild!
1st Burghley CCI5* – MGH Grafton Street
1st Gatcombe Advanced – Majas Hope
1st Aston Le Walls Advanced – Billy Walk On
Team Silver Europeans Luhmuhlen – Majas Hope
3rd Hartpury CCI4* S – MGH Grafton Street
5th Barbury CCI4* S – MGH Grafton Street
5th Barbury CCI4* S – Billy Wonder
6th Blenheim CCI4*L – Billy Walk On
8th Gatcombe CCI4* S – Billy Walk On
16th Badminton CCI5*L – Majas Hope
Perhaps the cherry on the top of a seriously successful sporting year for Pippa was her incredible triumph over the likes of Dame Sarah Storey of Para Cycling fame, the record breaking athlete Dina Asher-Smith and two-time Olympic Champion Martial Artist, Jade Jones MBE, when she won the public vote and and was crowned BT Sport’s Action Woman of the year 2019.
Based on athletes’ individual achievements, a shortlist of nominees was selected by a panel of judges including BT Sport’s Clare Balding OBE and Rachel Brown-Finnis, Caroline Barker, Tammy Parlour MBE co-founder of the Women’s Sport Trust, Jude Kelly CBE Director of the WOW foundation and Adam Sills, Head of Sport at the Telegraph and Pippa was picked as the public’s winner!
In amongst all of this Pippa also competed at numerous top level Show Jumping shows across the UK and Europe posting numerous top ten results AND she even had time to impart some of her famous knowledge and mentor our 2019 riders.
We are very lucky to have such an amazing athlete (and human being) as part of our team!!
