‘Whirlwind spell’ for para rider making championship debut just months after giving birth

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Published In Features
Sarah Slattery and Savona at the European PAra Dressage Championships
Sarah Slattery and Savona compete in the European Para Dressage Championships 2023.
(Image credit: Benjamin Clark)

Not content with making her championship debut at the European Para Dressage Championships, Ireland’s Sarah Slattery managed to do so just five months after giving birth. She was riding Savona, a San Amour I x Expose 5 mare, who competed briefly at prix st georges level for Finland back in 2018.

Sarah is a grade V rider and while she didn’t trouble the leaders with 66.39% in her first test – after making an impromptu flying change in the counter canter – she’s on a steep learning curve. Sarah is fairly new to para dressage, having started competing internationally in 2021, and this horse is a new ride since the birth of her second child.

Martha Terry
Martha Terry
Features editor

Martha is an experienced journalist who is mad-keen on horses and dogs. Her reporting CV includes the Paris Olympics, European championships, Aachen World Equestrian Festival and World Cup finals. After growing up with assorted liver and white springer spaniels, she enjoyed 14 years with two rescue dogs. Now, her constant companion is Fidget, an extremely energetic and habitually muddy black and white springer. Martha has written on topics as diverse as a top horse’s clone to the best GPS trackers for dogs, as well as equestrian and rural matters for Country Life, The Field, The Times, The Spectator and The Telegraph alongside Horse & Hound.