Maria Eilberg

Maria started riding aged five on a Shetland pony called Midnight Cowboy. She was competing at the Weston Park Pony Club Championships aged 11 with Willoway Seasong, an international event pony she was given to ride after he had been written off due to a leg injury. After competing in a few one-day events, Willoway Seasong had another leg injury and the vet advised not to jump him anymore.

“He had nice paces, but I didn’t think we’d get onto the team for the Pony European Dressage Championships,” she says. They did, but Maria and Willoway Seasong didn’t make it to the 1998 Pony European Dressage Championships.

“We were at the final selection trials. We had done our tests and had been selected. Then we were asked to do a trot-up in the afternoon and he was lame,” says Maria philosophically. The following year she was given the ride on Manitu N, with whom she made her name and won her first medal at the 1999 Pony European Championships. She finished fifth individually, just three marks off the bronze medal.

“By this time I was hooked,” she says.

Maria is an Open University student in her “spare time”. She has taken German and French A’ Levels and hopes to study Spanish in the future.

“I hate going to a country and not being able to speak the language,” she says. She has also completed her British Dressage Apprenticeship with her father Ferdi.