Charlotte Adams-Lane is one of the top three elite double-harness
scurry drivers in the country.
Thanks to Princess Michael.
“I was about eight-years-old,” she says. “I was at the Sandringham
Horse Driving Trials with my mother, who was the stable manager. I was bored
after riding and wandered off by myself around the grounds.
“Princess Michael picked me up and took me back to my mother. John and
Christine Dick, who were world famous carriage drivers were warming up their
team of four horses at the time. They took me for a one-hour drive through
the Sandringham estate.
“I was hooked. I wanted to do nothing but driving.”
Now, 20-years later, the big money is
on her to win this
year’s HOYS Double- harness Scurry Championships.
The fact Charlotte, or Charlie as she is known in the world of
scurry driving, is involved with horses is not surprising. The
surprise is it’s scurry driving.
Charlie, who comes from Rutland, says she’s
been riding
since she was born. “My mother, Sarah, was one of the most
respected show pony producers in the country,” she says. “She
ran the Riding Stud at Seaton.
“My father, James, came into horses late in life. He helped with the
Stud. Living in Rutland, we bordered three great hunting areas, the Cottesmore,
the Woodland Pytchley and the Beaver. We all used to go hunting with all three
packs.”
<< Charlotte with Fast Forwards and Rewind.
Her first pony, Bengad Nettle was 11.2, grey.
“We did everything,” says Charlie. “We hunted.
We went to all the Shows.” Until that fateful day at Sandringham.
“After I went out with John and Christine, I kept badgering my mother
to let me take up driving. Eventually, they bought me a driving pony. I was
thrilled. I started practising and practising. At fourteen, I started
competing.”
And she is still as competitive as ever
She has three pairs:
- Rip and Tear. Both home-bred British riding ponies, which,
she says, make the best scurry ponies. Rip is 12. Tear
is 14. In Dressage terms, she says, both would be Grand
Prix if not Olympic standard.
- Fast Forwards and Rewind. Both Welsh A ponies.
Fast Forwards, Charlie says, she bought at Ashford Market in
Kent for “meat money”. Nobody wanted him, she adds,
because he has “the eyes of a 17 hander and the head
of an 11 hand Section A”. He is 12. Rewind, by
comparison, is handsome. His problem is that he is temperamental.
One day he can be the best pony in the world. The next day
he can be the worst. He is 16.
- Fast and Furious. They are known as the Essex Girls. They
are half-sisters and they come from Basildon. Both are four-years
old. Charlie describes Fast as “very quick” and
Furious as “bloody livid.”
She has developed her own training programme. She has created
her own feeding regime with the help of husband, Ian, who launched
and runs Balanced Horse Feeds, one of the top ten feed manufacturers
in the country. Charlie has also perfected her own individual
exercise schedule.
Charlotte with Rip and Tear >>
Novices, she says, require one-hours work a day. The rest make
do with a trip in an old competition carriage about once a week
to the local pub, Riverspoons, about two-mile from where
they live in Chessington, Surrey.
So what makes her a great scurry champion?
“I think it’s what you would call natural horsemanship,” she
says. “Somehow I seem to be able to understand how horses think. I can
understand their whole environment.”
Is she nervous zooming through one obstacle after another in
a tiny carriage at speeds of up to 40 miles an hour?
“You’ve got to be,” she says. “If not, it’s dangerous.”
Click
here to read about Ian Adams Lane
