ABOUT DEBBY LUSH

I've always had a vivid imagination and, until I was 9 years old, I owned and rode a string of imaginary horses.

Until then I was a competitive swimmer (backstroke), competing for my club and training 2 or 3 nights a week. Riding lessons happened once a fortnight for half an hour at the local riding school. Then I was asked to make a decision: swimming or riding. It wasn't hard! My mother was delighted - as a child she'd always wanted a pony, but living in London it hadn't been practical, so now she could finally buy that longed-for pony.

She sold her fur coat to finance the purchase of Starlight (she always joked that she was only exchanging one fur coat for another, just that the second one had a pony inside it), and Star duly arrived from Cornwall where he had been working in a friend's riding school. He was a disaster - a riding school pony through and through, he wouldn't move without another pony in front of him. He was also traffic shy, and he dumped me with a sharp spook at precisely the same place on every hack. A month later he was sold to the local riding school and we went pony hunting.

After Star, my nerve was rather shaky, so my next pony was of necessity rather lazy. Marquis did a bit of everything, and would jump nicely at home, but at a show he knew 3 refusals meant you could leave the ring, so until I was 14 and really too big for him, that's exactly what he did.

We've always lived near Hickstead, so all my youthful ambitions revolved around show jumping. I was a very active Pony Club member, and mother became an Area Organiser so we could be assured of getting the best Instructors, but by the time I was winning classes on 13.2hh Marquis, I needed something taller. Mum didn't want to buy another pony for me to grow out of, so a 15hh coloured Irish cob called Mickey came next. With him I discovered hunting and Hunter Trials as well as show jumping, and represented my PC branch in Eventing. Dad also drove him - a true all rounder.

About this time I did my first teaching - at Pony Club camp where I had a class of 3 Shetlands and a Dartmoor. I was hooked.

Flight of Fancy was my first proper horse - a chestnut mare. We did everything - show jumped Newcomers and Foxhunters, Novice Eventing, showing at County level - Working Hunters and Riding Horse - affiliated Dressage to Medium level, and Side-saddle showing and Equitation, qualifying for the National Championships where we did everything from show jumping to handy horse classes as well as the Equitation Finals.

Fancy accompanied me on my Gap year, when I worked as a groom for event rider Annabel Scrimgeour, doing my Pony Club A test and my BHSAI. It was during this year that I saw two riders lose their horses to unfortunate cross-country accidents and decided that I didn't want to risk that happening to my one precious horse. Mum was vastly relieved - she always supported me, but she hated the risks of eventing and was delighted when I gave up.

This year was also the start of my judging career - I began at a Pony Club event, with a class of under 10s doing a walk and trot test. By the time I went to Nottingham University I was judging Riding Club classes, and that continued while I studied, as did my teaching. I captained my University team and after Graduating with a BSc (Hons) in Animal Science, I went on to judge University matches.

My plan at this point was to take a Postgraduate at the Veterinary research centre at Cambridge, working on embryo transfer, but before an opening became available I took a job instructing at the local riding school, then became involved in a livery yard venture, and somehow it never happened. I ran two yards and freelanced for a number of years, and came into possession of Mozart, a 17.3hh Trakehner X Hanoverian stallion who was trained to Grand Prix, but with such badly damaged hind fetlocks he was lame as often as sound. On his better days he taught me so much I became totally hooked on dressage. I also learned about riding and handling stallions, and did some stud work with him before he died suddenly, aged 12, of an aneurysm in his gut. The autopsy showed severe worm damage, probably from as early as 2 or 3 years old, before he was imported from Denmark. I was devastated.

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