Carl Hester, dressage rider

Desert Island Discs

BBC

Society & Culture, Music Commentary, Music, Personal Journals

4.4 • 13.7K Ratings

🗓️ 21 November 2021

⏱️ 35 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Carl Hester is a dressage rider who has competed in six Olympic Games, winning a team gold at London 2012. Carl grew up on Sark in the Channel Islands, where cars are banned and horses are part of the island’s daily life. He learned to ride on a donkey before progressing to horses. After leaving school, his first job was at an equine therapy centre in Hampshire. A key moment in his early career was an invitation from Dr Wilfried Bechtolsheimer, a leading figure in dressage, to join his yard. In 1992 Carl became the youngest ever British rider to compete at an Olympic Games. As well as a gold in London in 2012, he and the team won silver in Rio in 2016, and earlier this year a bronze medal in Tokyo, where he was the oldest member of Team GB. Carl has also enjoyed great success as a trainer of horses, including Valegro, once described as the ‘Lionel Messi of the dressage world.’ He has also mentored the rider Charlotte Dujardin, currently Britain’s most successful female Olympian along with the cyclist Laura Kenny. He lives near Newent in Gloucestershire and says he hopes to compete at the Paris Olympics in 2024. DISC ONE: Castles by Freya Ridings DISC TWO: Fleurs Du Mal by Sarah Brightman DISC THREE: Brand New Key by Melanie DISC FOUR: Some Girls by Racey DISC FIVE: Slave to Love by Bryan Ferry DISC SIX: Barcelona by Freddie Mercury & Montserrat Caballé DISC SEVEN: The Windmills of Your Mind by Noel Harrison DISC EIGHT: Bette Davis Eyes by Kim Carnes BOOK CHOICE: The Centenary Book of Sark: a history and description of the artist William A Toplis by Chris Andrews, Fiona Kelly and Amy McKee LUXURY ITEM: Carl’s own pillow CASTAWAY'S FAVOURITE: Bette Davis Eyes by Kim Carnes Presenter Lauren Laverne Producer Sarah Taylor

Transcript

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0:00.0	BBC Sounds Music Radio Podcasts
0:04.8	Hello, I'm Lauren LeVern and this is the Desert Island Disks Podcast.
0:08.4	Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take
0:13.2	with them if they were cast away to a desert island.
0:16.3	And for right reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast.
0:21.0	I hope you enjoy listening.
0:42.1	My cast away this week is the dressage rider Karl Hester.
0:45.8	A groundbreaking Olympian, he brought home the first ever British gold medal for dressage
0:50.9	with his teammates at the London 2012 Olympics. He was the youngest British rider ever to compete
0:56.4	when he took part in his first games in 1992. This year, at 54, he was the most senior British
1:02.7	Olympian in Tokyo, winning a team bronze medal and he hopes to be at the next Olympics in Paris.
1:08.8	His three Olympic medals sit alongside many other international prizes and accolades,
1:14.2	including a British horse show Queens Award and an MBE for services to equestrianism.
1:20.3	His path to glory in this elite world was far from typical however. He grew up on Sark in the
1:26.3	Channel Islands, a car-free landmass just two miles square where horses are a mode of transport.
1:32.2	So although he made his name by mastering the art of the most precise form of horsemanship,
1:37.2	a sport he has likened to gymnastics, he started out riding a donkey and earning pocket money,
1:42.9	taking tourists around the island in a horse-drawn carriage. He says, the thrill, the joy,
1:48.4	the satisfaction and sometimes the frustration of this sport for me is in bringing horses up
1:54.2	and their journey from being promising untried youngsters to expressing their talents and personalities.
2:00.6	Karl Hester, welcome to Desert Island Discs. Thank you.
2:04.1	So-called dress-arge origins go back centuries but the sport itself can look pretty out there
	...

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