How much do you know about Yasmin Ingham, Britain’s new world eventing champion? Check out these nine fun facts…
1. Yasmin was the pony European champion in 2013 on Craig Mor Tom. In a parallel with her 2022 eventing World Championships victory, that medal was also won in Italy, at Arezzo.
2. She is the first rider competing as an individual, rather than as a team rider, to take the World Championship title.
3. Yasmin is from the Isle of Man, where her mother Lesley was a manager at a large equestrian centre called Kennaa, and she competed for a few years in working hunter showing classes, qualifying for the Royal International Horse Show and Horse of the Year Show. The island’s government congratulated her on social media after her win.
“It’s an amazing place to grow up – so tiny, but so friendly,” she says.
4. She has won the British eventing championships at all four “under” levels – 16, 18, 21 and 25.
5. She had two run-outs across country at her first pony Europeans, in 2012 and that motivated her to train all winter, with a vision of standing on a podium with a gold medal round her neck.
She remembers: “We spent a whole pony training session with Yogi Breisner doing halts and I said to him, ‘I’m going to do a perfect halt and then I’m going to win a gold medal.’ He laughed and when I did win, he sent me a postcard saying, ‘Perfect halt – and congratulations on your gold medals.’”
6. Yasmin met fellow Isle of Man resident Sue Davies and her daughter Janette Chinn, who own her World Championship ride Banzai Du Loir and at whose yard Yasmin is based, because her mother Lesley wrote them a letter saying the Inghams were huge fans of the horses Sue and Janette owned with Mary King and suggesting they meet for coffee.
7. The 25-year-old’s first five-star ride was at Pau Horse Trials in 2018 when she finished 16th on her own and her parents Lesley and Stephen’s Night Line.
8. Yasmin is a graduate of the Wesko Equestrian Foundation programme, which supports promising young event riders in memory of Christina Knudsen, who owned Tim Price’s five-star winner Wesko. Wesko was second at Kentucky Three-Day Event in 2015; Yasmin was second there this spring on Banzai Du Loir.
9. She represented the Isle of Man branch of the Pony Club at the Pony Club Championships in 2011, finishing second in her section and winning the cross-country horsemanship bursary. Her prize was a week’s training with Jane Holderness-Roddam. During her visit, Jane – an Olympic team gold medallist in 1968 in Mexico – showed Yasmin her scrapbooks of her Olympic achievements, which inspired her dream of competing at the top level.
You might also be interested in:
‘The dream finish’: fairytale result as Britain celebrates new world champion in Pratoni
Meet Yasmin Ingham’s groom Alison Bell: ‘I never thought I would be in this position’
Yasmin Ingham leads Blenheim CCI4*-L on Paris 2024 prospect Banzai Du Loir: ‘You don’t want to let him down’
Mark Phillips: mixed emotions and tight margins at the World Championships
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