About me
Victoria discovered horses at an early age; her Grandma who helped her dad bring her brother and her up, thought that it would be nice to take them both for pony rides from about the age of three. For Victoria it stuck and she progressed onto riding lessons as soon as she was able.
From this, Victoria became a keen member of Essex Union South Pony Club, riding in various teams with her first pony, 14.1hh Buzby. Encouraged by the Pony Club, Victoria developed a passion for eventing. She loved the thrill and adrenaline rush that she got when you go cross country. Plus the fact that as her pony’s name was Buzby, her colours were yellow and black back then so she got to dress up like a bumble bee! These days Victoria is usually seen out on course in a striking pink hat cover with white stars, and Buzby has made way for a growing string of ex-racehorses, forming the team VB Eventing.
Victoria's love for retraining ex racehorses stemmed from a chance encounter arranged by her husband Jason. They weren't technically looking for a second horse however and she certainly didn't have a very big budget to play with either. Jason was away on business and ended up staying a further unplanned night in a hotel. He was bored and so started looking on websites at horses for sale. He found a horse which looked quite nice and so phoned the owner without consulting Victoria. The following day when he returned home, he told Victoria what he had done and that he had arranged to go and see this horse the following day because he liked the look of it! The problem was Victoria was due to be at work which caused her a bit of a problem! However, she managed to wangle a very last minute day off and they we drove down to Sussex to see the horse.
Upon their arrival and at first seeing the horse, Victoria was not taken by him at all, he was very small and petit and just not her cup of tea. However, all that changed for the better when she hopped onboard and took off up the gallops. Her immediate thought was "this is my XC machine" and the big grin on her face when she returned to Jason at the stables simply said it all! The next problem was that technically this horse had actually already been sold the day before to a lady who had simply got on him and walked him up the road, but luckily for Victoria she had not left a deposit. Victoria asked the owner how much extra she could give him to ease his conscience for selling the horse to her instead but to start with he wasn't having any of it, so they left. Not longer than 5 minutes later Victoria's phone rang and it was the owner giving her a price. Ten minutes later Victoria and Jason found themselves at a nearby service station standing in front of a cash machine doing a "dodgy deal" handing over the deposit for the horse, the rest as they say is history and "the horse" turned out to be my ‘wonderboy’ Crystal Ka who has now taken her further up the British eventing levels than she has ever been before- to Intermediate and CIC2* in just 3 years.
Victoria also competes regularly in British Dressage up to Advanced Medium level. She has had numerous wins and placing a at all levels including a number of qualifications for Regional finals.
Victoria competes up to Foxhunter level within British Showjumping.
Sometimes in a life with horses, do you find the horse or does the horse find you? Every top Rider that you will ever read about will pinpoint their initial success to one particular special horse. Crystal Ka was the start of Victoria's love of racehorses and is the one that re-ignited her passion for eventing. Victoria still to this day keeps in touch with Ian, his previous owner, and he has met Victoria at a couple of events and is absolutely thrilled that his racehorse that didn't make the grade in one discipline has definitely made the grade in another.
Since buying Crystal Ka and falling in love with racehorses, Victoria has now retrained a number of horses that she has either kept or sold on, as they have excelled in one specific element of eventing. Some of the horses Victoria has sold have gone on to compete in solely dressage or show jumping along with another couple of horses that are now ridden at various riding and pony club events.
The horses come to Victoria in many different ways, whether that is through the Brightwells Auction, adverts, rescues or directly from the Racing yards as we now have relationships with a number of racehorse trainers in Newmarket.
Victoria also has a love of coaching and has a huge database of clients she coaches on a regular basis.