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You are here: Home / Articles / Equestrian Life

H&H Exclusive: Should you ride while pregnant?

Seamour Rathore, H&H features editor

September 6, 2007

H&H tackles a thorny issue by asking whether riding and competing during pregnancy is an ill-advised trend

Increasingly riders are competing while pregnant, but is this trend an ill-advised one? Journalist Charlotte Mackaness talks to riders and medical experts in today's Horse & Hound (6 September, '07) to discover what issues mothers-to-be need to consider.

Famous competing mothers

Double individual Olympic gold medalist Anky van Grunsven (pictured) was pregnant with her first child Yannick when she won gold at the Athens Olympics in 2004.
Mary King won gold at the 1995 Europeans when 5.5 months pregnant
Molly Ashe-Cawley was part of the American team that won the Hickstead show jumping Nations Cup in July while four months pregnant

Peter Bowen-Simpkins, spokesman for the Royal College of Obstetricians and Gynaecologists says: "The major danger caused by riding occurs after 28 weeks. The risks aren't associated with the process of riding as such, but with falling off and landing on your tummy."

He believes the likelihood of taking a tumble increases with pregnancy, but adds: "Also, during the first 12 weeks there is a relationship between trauma and miscarriage."

Don't miss H&H's exclusive feature on the pros and cons of riding when pregnant in Horse & Hound (6 September 2007)