4 – 13 July: Summer Showjumping Tour show report

For the second year running the rain played its part in the 2024 Summer Showjumping Tour.  It was really well supported with competitors travelling from all over the country to be at Bicton for nine days of fantastic showjumping despite that rain!

Oliver Tuff, who won the British Horse Feeds Speedi-Beet HOYS Grade C Qualifier with seven-year-old mare Miss Money Penny is one of our local competitors from Redpost Equestrian a long-term sponsor and great supporter of Bicton Arena. Oliver had great things to say about Miss Money Penny, “She is very consistent and has jumped a lot of clear rounds through the age classes. We’ll give her a break before HOYS and just do a couple of indoor classes together ready.

“I always enjoy the Summer Tour at Bicton – despite the weather!  Andrew and Helen really do a good job keeping the going good,” he added.

We also spoke to Angie Thompson who had a fairly long three-and-a-half-hour journey from Chipping Campden in Gloucestershire had an amazingly busy show with 16 horses from her yard at the show.  “We had a very busy time helping everyone out as well as jumping eight of my own. We had some great wins at 1.15m and 1.30m but coming in first place in the Bicton Arena 1.45m Grand Prix with Sanavisto was the icing on the cake!” said Angie.

Also commenting on the weather conditions Angie had high praise for the team at Bicton, “When it rains at Bicton it really rains it was torrential at times.  The team worked so hard to move jumps and look after the ground – working tirelessly in quite dire conditions. We moved on to the surfaces after the rain had been really bad for a few days then one nice day of sun and a lovely breeze and we were back on the wonderful old turf again.  We just love Bicton you can bring lots of horses of all ages and give them experience as well as jumping the bigger tracks on our best ones, our clients enjoy it and the prizes are always really worth winning. Thank you!”

Bicton Arena Co-Director, Andrew Fell said,

“I feel as if wherever I am the rain follows me at the moment – once again the team and all the volunteers pulled together and made it work moving jumps, changing arenas, then moving jumps back again – all in a day’s work!  Thanks to all our competitors, grooms, clients and spectators for making it a super Summer Show Jumping Tour here at Bicton despite the weather.”

Come rain or shine our team worked hard to pull off another other fantastic few weeks of competition. I am always grateful to my team, both our core staff and our army of volunteers who make it happen, but this month has been challenging and I am proud of what we have achieved.”