East Park Riding for the Disabled Group

Our good friends at the MG Car Club Sussex Wanderers have given us a fantastic donation of £2,300 raised from collections at their meetings during 2022. Each month they set off on a jolly in their wonderful cars, ending up with a lunch at a pub, where the hat is passed round. The members are very generous and we are very grateful to them.

On 2nd February Ursula Griffiths came to watch a lesson with some of the members and their cars, and to hand over the cheque. (Yes we know the one in the middle isn’t an MG – it sneaked in!)

We are very grateful to The Incorporated Church Institute (Upper Tooting) Limited who have been tremendous supporters over many years, and this year have come up with a fantastic £17,000 to fund our riders for the current year.

Other donations include £800 from the Dormansland Horse and Dog Show, £690 from a Masonic Lodge, £500 from the East Grinstead Lions Donkey Derby, £100 from the After Eight Ladies and £100 from RDA.

Four children and two ponies went to Hartpury to compete in the National Championships on an extremely hot weekend in July. Star and Guy went with them and between them they did very well with the following results:

Oscar – Countryside Challenge Junior National Qualifier – 5th
Erin – Countryside Challenge Junior VI National Qualifier – 4th
Zoe – Countryside Challenge Junior VI National Qualifier – 3rd
Tyler – Countryside Challenge Junior VI Regional Class – 5th

Four of our riders from St Stephen’s School, Zoe, Erin, Tyler & Oscar, competed at the Regional Qualifiers at Felbridge and all four qualified to compete at the National Championships in July.

The ponies, Star and Guy, were beautifully turned out and behaved themselves impeccably.

Our thanks are due to all the team of volunteers and supporters who made this such a special day.

Meet our new pony, Leo.

The newest member of Team East Park is a beautiful 10 year old skewbald 14.1 gelding. Leo arrived at Little Brook early May and has been getting used to the routine of his new home.

Despite coming with excellent references as a terrific general all-rounder, Leo has been checked out thoroughly before being used in RDA group sessions, which he has started this week, and it is expected he will now be taking some of the workload off our older ponies.

Leo was funded by donations from Thursday volunteer leader Nick Fieldhouse, East Grinstead Lions (including the remaining funds donated in memory of respected member and East Park Volunteer Rob Holwell) and Redhill Redstone Rotary. Our grateful thanks go out to them all.