Hi, my name is Flossie England and I'm from Horncastle in Lincolnshire. I'm a para show jumper and at age 11 was the youngest classified para show jumper in the country. I am now 18 and based in Lincolnshire. I’ve been a member of the local Pony Club branch since I was 4 and at the age of 10, I started para show jumping. Due to a traumatic birth, I have a condition called Erb’s Palsy which means I have reduced strength, movement and sensation in my right arm. I had the first operation when I was three months old which involved grafting nerves from my legs to try and repair the severed nerves in my neck. The second, when I was 7, was a tendon transfer to give me more movement in my wrist. My right arm will always be shorter and weaker than my left. Luckily, I had two great ponies that were sensitive. So, if need be, I could stop them with one hand which helped a lot, and I used looped reins designed and made for me by a local saddler.
My 13.2 pony, Ricky, was great; we competed at the British Show Jumping Nationals for 3 years on the trot. Once I moved onto my 14.2 pony, Freddie ( the white pony in the photo), I started to event more and got the bug! Freddie and I competed up to BE100 and were selected for the East Midland squad to compete at the Youth International, as well as qualifying for the Pony Club Championships intermediate dressage and eventing and Badminton Grassroots! After Badminton 2022 he sadly went up for sale as I was getting too tall for him and with A-levels I struggled to keep on top of both him and Orla. Orla is a 6-year-old Irish Sport Horse. This season (2022) we have competed at BE90 as we get to know each other and also competed in some Pony Club teams. We were picked for the Pony Club show jumping team at Burghley in September. She is still a work in progress, but I was really pleased with how she coped with the atmosphere and she jumped a lovely round; losing at bit of balance towards the end of the course.
A 2022 Season round-up!
This season has been a mixed one! We have competed at some amazing places - Badminton, Bramham and Burghley to name a few! But it was cut short when I had an operation at the start of September.
Freddie and I had qualified for the Voltaire Grassroots Championships held at Badminton, so we spent all winter training and preparing. It was an amazing experience competing at such a prestigious event, but Fred got stage fright so didn’t quite get the result we were hoping for. However, we were nonetheless proud of just getting there.
Bramham hold a para show jumping competition which is always a favourite of ours. It was the first time Orla had seen anything like it with crowds on all four sides on the arena. She behaved impeccably but got a little speedy causing a couple of poles. As we got to know each other we found a lower gear before competing at Burghley in the Pony Club team show jumping competition. She jumped a lovely round that I was really, really pleased with! After being on such a high after Burghley and feeling like we’d cracked it and were looking forward to the next events where I could put it into action, I got a phone call from my surgical team saying my operation would be the next week. So that put a stop to that!
My injury is a nerve injury meaning the nerves that supply my right arm are damaged. Over the last couple of years, I have been getting altered sensation and strength in my hand. This has made it quite hard to ride as I couldn’t feel my hand and at times lost all strength making it very hard to turn right or keep a balanced contact on the flat. Cubital tunnel syndrome is relatively common but as my surgeon put it: “enough of your nerves don’t work, so it would be best if the ones that do, keep working”. So, she wasn’t a fan of waiting till after the event season had finished before operating! I tried to see the positives to this thinking I would have a lot more time to focus on applying for university, as I was an early applicant, but in reality, I spent just as much time up at the yard! I can now ride again after a few weeks recovery and I am looking forward to a busy winter training getting ready for next season where I hope to step Orla up the levels after my exams have finished!