An amateur rider from Okehampton and her horse have qualified for the prestigious Horse of the Year Show.

Sophie Williams and her purebred Irish Draught horse called Silver Lily of Mourne will be making their second appearance at the show in Birmingham in October after passing the qualifier on April 1.

The pair made the trip to Hartpury University near Gloucester for the SEIB Search for a Star qualifier. They competed and won the Show Hunter class under top judges Nicola Taylor and Richard Ramsay to earn their Horse of the Year Show qualification.

Sophie said: “I’ve owned Lily since she was a foal and we’ve done everything together. She’s seven now and we mainly compete in showing and go hunting on Exmoor together. Lily is one of four Irish Draught full siblings we have, I mainly show the younger ones In-Hand. This is the first time we’ve done Search for a Star, we mainly compete in local and county shows although we qualified for the London Horse Show last year and took 7th place! I work as a nurse and swapped shifts to come to the qualifier today.”

SEIB Search for a Star first took place back in 1996 and over the years has provided thousands of opportunities for amateur riders to compete at Horse of the Year Show.

Each of the SEIB Search for a Star qualifying shows offers opportunities for a full range of show horses to earn a place at the series championships at Horse of the Year Show and Your Horse Live.

Nicolina MacKenzie, SEIB Search for a Star organiser, said: “What a start to the season for Search for a Star and Racehorse to Riding Horse. There was such a positive atmosphere at Hartpury and the standard of horses and ponies coming forward was fabulous to see.”