Ascot Teams up with Riding A Dream Academy to deliver riding lessons to TLA

Ascot Racecourse has teamed up with the Riding A Dream Academy (part of the British Racing School) to give 50 students from Slough the chance to ride for the first time through a series of Taster Days which were run at the course last week.

TLA were invited to take part in the pilot scheme and bring 10 students aged 14-16 for an exclusive Academy Taster Day which acts as a hands-on-introduction to the sport. Hosted at the stables of the world-famous racecourse, five specially chosen horses and ponies were brought from the British Racing School to allow the students to participate in a range of activities during their day including:

• A horse handling session where they learned how to look after a horse including grooming, parts of the body and welfare.
• A riding session where they learned the foundations of riding including getting on, steering, jockey pose and a sitting trot.

Students also had the chance to:

• Take part in a simulator session where they worked on their jockey pose.
• Go behind the scenes at Ascot, the world’s most famous racecourse and find out about its unique heritage and standing in global horseracing.

The Taster Days are based on an existing Academy scheme which already takes place at the British Racing School and saw 180 young people, predominantly from London, take part in 2023/24.

The students were a credit to the academy and behaved impeccably throughout the process. Mr Evans was very impressed with the attitude and effort from the students.

The students selected were Manha, Raniyah, Seeta, Haripriya, Jessica, Daisha, Eve, Phoebe and Leah.