£13,000 raised in the 2020 Sponsored Ride

WVS Stables raises £13,000 for Charities with its Fancy Dress Sponsored Ride

Richmond Park, place of lovely scenery, fabulous trees and numerous deer, looking quietly on; place of The Tiger King! – NHS workers in scrubs on horseback! – the Mad Hatter! – Princess Marida!!  On Sunday 18th October and Tuesday 20th October,

something was just a bit different in the park.  No, it wasn’t time to get your eyes tested.  Yes, it was the spectacular WVS Sponsored Horse Rides, raising money for the Royal Marsden Cancer Charity and Wimbledon & Putney Commons Conservators.  This event was started in 1977 by Carol Andrews, owner of WVS Stables, and Caroline Stevenson, senior instructor.  Year after year characters in amazing costumes, with decorated horses, ride out across Wimbledon Common and round Richmond Park.  The rides have raised thousands and thousands of pounds for our local charities.

Let’s visit WVS’s yard, where all this creativity takes place.  We looked around:  one direction, lady in romantic green medieval dress spraying her hair orange – allow me to introduce you to Princess Marida; lady putting on a moustache and tee-shirt with ready drawn arm tattoos, I introduce Joe Exotic; lady with flowery hat and thick blond hair, I introduce Carole Baskin.  Meanwhile horses are being spray painted, some with tiger stripes, some with hearts and diamonds and some with pink spots.  A Pumpkin walks past Minnie Mouse whilst Hagar the Horrible, with wonderfully crafted horned helmet, adds furs to his outfit.  It’s all a bit Disney making.  We asked “Judge-John”, John White of the Stable’s Events Committee, dressed in his High Court robes, what special themes he was looking for in his judging this year, “My starting points are imagination, arts and crafts and humour but this event is unique – it’s the winners themselves, by their very creativity, that define the winning strategy.  Everyone takes the event very seriously indeed and makes a huge effort with their costumes.  It’s an amazing piece of theatre and it requires a very exacting piece of judging.”

This year, because of the Covid restrictions, our riders had to go out in teams of four, staggered to comply with social distancing rules.  Therefore, the full parade up and down the High Street was not possible but it will be back.  On returning to the yard special socially distanced ceremonies commemorated the:  prize winning costumes, most funds raised for charity; and best rider of the day.

Sunday’s ride produced prizes, for:  1st, The Tiger King, tiger themed horses with Joe Exotic (Heidi) and Carole Baskin (Emma); 2nd, NHS workers with rainbow decorated horses, (Deborah and Peter); 3rd, The Mad Hatter, with amazing hat, Helen; 4th, The Queen of Hearts with frizzy bright red wig (Aneen), 5th, Red and white pullover wearing, big round glasses, Where’s Wally (Rachel) and equal 6th, cricket gear wearing Ben Stokes (Ella) and Cowboy (Marcus).  Tuesday brought us:  1st The chilling Corpse Bridge, blue face and spider web veil, 2nd, Horned helmet wearing, Haggar the Horrible, (Terry), Romantic green gown and bright orange hair, Princess Marida, 4th, Orange is the New Black, with accessory chucky chain, handcuffs for bracelets and complete with prison number (Charlotte) 5th, equal tied, Minnie Mouse, with feature ears (Susan) and The Pumpkin in feature orange (Lottie), and 6th prize went to our youngest rider of the day, cheerleader, Nina.  The highest funds raised from sponsored riders were:  Rachel Hilton, £1085; Aneen van Deventer, £975; Laura Taylor, £838.87 and Helen Shelley, £728.13, with Carol and Caroline raising between them, £2,500.

What a magnificent couple of days and what a wonderful success this year’s WVS Sponsored Rides produced, thanks to the dedication, creativity and skill of all involved.