The British Dressage Northern Region Regional Championships Featuring Bishop Burton Winter Regionals The British Dressage Northern Region is a geographical segment of British Dressage and takes pride in welcoming all dressage enthusiasts into its world of ultimate dressage adventure. There are competitions and events which cater for combinations (Full and Associate members) of all levels from Walk and Trot tests through to Grand Prix dressage. The easiest way to start competing within British Dressage is to become a Full Member or Associate Member and enter the competitions dependent on your level of dressage. Classes start from Intro and Prelim; from there you can climb the ladder. The British Dressage Northern Region, Regional Championships is exactly what it states in the title. Once again this involves score collecting from qualifiers and non-qualifiers in your level (Prelim Intermediate I) at British Dressage Competitions. If you collect enough scores and points to qualify for the Regional Championships 2014 then before the 31 st May you are in with a chance to compete at Fry s Summer Regionals on the 5 th -7 th August 2014, which may lead to success at the British Dressage National Championships held at Stoneleigh in September. Winter Regional Championships Preliminary Intermediate I The winter qualifiers, running between 1 June and 30 November, are qualifying classes for the Winter Regional Championships, through which you can qualify for the Winter Championships, held annually in April at Hartpury College, Gloucestershire. Riders must be members of BD to enter qualifiers at all levels. From Novice level upwards and horses must be registered for all classes entered. At Preliminary level riders must be members of BD and ride fully registered horses or those which have an associate horse registration to compete in these qualifiers. Horses must be fully registered in order to compete at Regional Championships. Qualification at Prelim only comes from Prelim Qualifying Classes. In these classes Horse will be awarded Prelim Points to the same scale as all other classes. Prelim Points are for qualification purposes only and do not count towards the upgrading of a horse. You can find qualifying classes for these championships in British Dressage magazine s show schedule and on our website (see Schedules) by looking out for the letter Q after the test, for example N37WQ means novice 37 winter qualifier and AM86SQ stands for
Advanced Medium 86 summer qualifier. Non qualifier classes can be identified as follows; E44W elementary 44 winter non qualifier and E44S elementary 44 summer non qualifier. At all levels levels you will need to qualify through the points based system. Please refer to the qualification requirements table below: Level Points needed Points from Minimum % qualifiers Preliminary 19 19 65 Novice 19 10 65 Novice Open 20 10 67 Elementary 15 8 64 Elementary Open 18 9 66 Medium 10 5 63 Medium Open 16 8 64 Adv Med 8 4 63 Adv Med Open 10 5 64 PSG & Inter I 6 6 63 Take a look at some British Dressage Northern Region riders who made it to the Bishop Burton Winter Regionals Feb 2014 The British Dressage Northern Region held its Winter Regionals at Bishop Burton from the 8 th 11 th February. Denise Mitchell
Kevin Sparrow photography picture (left) is of Ellie Worral receiving her First Prize on Despereaux and Denise Mitchell (pictured right) on the Lap of Honour for third place. Denise says We live just outside Leeds near Temple Newsam. Ellie Worrall who is only 19 and keeps her horses with us at Gamblethorpe and she managed to come 8th in the Preliminary. Ellie then rode Despereaux in the Novice for Margaret Stuart and rode an amazing test despite only ever competing Des twice before and managed to WIN!!!!! The following day (no pressure on me) I rode Despereaux in the Elementary and I am the first to say I have never been as nervous in my life before...how I held my breath for 6 minutes I will never know and I managed to remember my test which at my age is a great achievement (54) and the biggest shock of all was the fact that I even came 3rd! So as you can see we have had a great weekend...the staff and facilities at Bishop Burton were really good especially the arena surfaces and the lovely hot showers! We would recommend this venue to anyone. We are now looking forward to our trip to Hartpury with Ellie for the Novice Winter National Championships! Annabel Farmer Wizard and I had a wonderful time at our first Winter Regionals. Everyone was so friendly and helpful as normal. Wizard settled really well and did a lovely test coming away with a 63.62% not enough to get into the placings but we were just so thrilled to get there and represent the Northern Region!
Roberta Sheffield We had a fantastic, if a little wild Saturday at the Regionals! I won the Novice Open title on my young horse, Double Agent (Darcy). I was the only Para rider in the class and I believe that I am the first Grade 3 Para to win a Regional Championship! It was totally beyond my expectations to win this class. I never thought I would win an Open champs as the standard of riding and horses is so high. Darcy s next big show will be as part of the Canadian team at Deauville CPEDI3* in April with the view to selection for the World Equestrian Games in August. I hope that she will not be too tired to come home for only a few days before contesting the Winter National Champs. Amelia and Geneva Low Amelia says I was competing a horse on behalf of one of my trainer s clients, during my warm up we had a mishap which saw me carted off to hospital in an ambulance. Due to my injuries, I was unable to ride my own horse Piebald Paddy in the novice music. Returning from hospital battered and bruised, 8.30pm that evening my sister Geneva said "I'll ride him for you!" Laughter brought out; but she was deadly serious!
I then made her listen to my music over and over and had to teach her the test that was only in my head! The following morning off she went on my 17hh Irish sports horse to compete in the regional finals doing a freestyle test which she had never ridden, to music she'd never ridden to and a horse she'd never competed! Together they achieved more than we ever thought possible, 65%, 10th place and in the mounted prize giving. While this was all happening my mother had arranged for my boyfriend to rescue Jack Wainwright following a blow out on the lorry, who also went on to win the class!! What a weekend! Summer Regional Qualifiers By competing in the summer qualifiers, which run from 1 December to 31 May, you can qualify for your local summer regional final and, ultimately, the National Dressage Championships, held annually in September at Stoneleigh Park, Warwickshire. The British Dressage Summer Regionals will be held at Fry s Dressage from 5 th 7 th August. Hope to see you there and good luck with your score collecting!