Lee Pearson
General:
Lee has a condition called arthrogryposis. This is when a foetus’s muscles don’t grow correctly while in the womb and cause joints to be limited in movement at birth. Lee had to have 15 operations and still can’t move his ankles or knees, so he controls horses using his hips. He walks with his legs completely splinted from hips to heels and uses crutches or an electric wheelchair to get about.
The reason Lee started riding was because he couldn’t pedal a bike. All his friends had BMX bikes. “Mine was a hairy version, Sally the donkey, who wouldn’t turn right and bucked everybody else off but me,” says Lee.
He went to a riding school for lessons when he was eight years old. When he was nine, he had his “dream Christmas” as he was given a pony. However, the pony bucked him off every day and Lee stopped riding for a while. He wasn’t put off for long and started riding for a local lady with hunters. Eventually, when he was 15, he bought his own horse, a former racehorse “as they were cheap and I didn’t have much money”.
Lee jumped, showed and did endurance, only discovering para dressage while watching the 1996 Atlanta Paralympics on television. He contacted the Riding for the Disabled Association (RDA), which was the governing body of the sport at the time, and eventually somebody came to assess him. “This chap came expecting me to have a finger missing or something as I had told him what I had been doing. He couldn’t believe I was so disabled, but I couldn’t believe they graded me in the most disabled category. Until then I hadn’t realised how disabled I was,” he says.
Although Lee is certified as a grade 1 rider, the level for the most disabled competitors, he rode Blue Circle Boy in the more technically difficult grade 3 classes in 2005. Lee now has a yard with six stables and spends his time producing horses. He has a groom to help him.
Lee's official website can be found at http://www.leepearson.co.uk/
Date of Birth:
4th February 1974.
Lives:
Cheddleton, Staffordsire.
Major Achievements:
Lee has won 24 gold medals since starting para dressage competitions in 1998. He won three of those at the
2000 Sydney Paralympics, another three at the 2004 Athens Paralympics, repeated this triple gold tally again
at the 2007 World Para Championships and again at the 2008 Beijing Paralympics. He has set an equestrian
world record by being unbeaten at three consecutive Paralympics.
In 2003, he became the only disabled person to have won a title at the British Dressage National Championships competing against able-bodied riders when he took the 2003 elementary restricted finals. In 2006 and 2007 and 2009, Lee won the Grade Ib Disabled Dressage Rider Championship at the National Dressage Championships.
He is currently Paralympic, World, European and National Champion for his grade. Lee was voted BBC Midlands Disabled Sports Person of the Year 2003 and 2004 as well as BBC Midlands Sports Personality of the Year 2004. He was warded an MBE in 2001 and an OBE in 2005 in recognition of his monumental equestrian success and services to sport for the disabled. Also in 2005, Lee was bestowed an honorary doctorate from Staffordshire University. Lee was awarded a CBE in the 2009 New Year Honours List for services to equestrianism and disabled sport.
Lee became the first chairman of the FEI (International Equestrian Federation) Athletes Committee in 2007.
In 2008, Lee continued to collect more trophies when he became the first recipient of the British Dressage
Para-Equestrian Dressage Rider of the Year.
Top horse(s):
Lee retired his top horse, Blue Circle Boy and found and trained Gentleman, his latest top horse, from a youngster to winning three gold medals at the 2008 Paralympics.
Age when started riding/why:
"Aged 8, because he couldn’t pedal a bike."
Name of first horse/pony:
"I had a donkey called Sally first but my first horse was called Duke."
First competitive experience:
“A fun ride when I was 15 on a four-year-old racehorse I had just bought who had come out of training a few days before.”
Trainer:
Ferdi Eilberg and I train myself a lot of the time. .
Most admired rider(s) :
“I was inspired when I watched a video of Germany’s Ulla Salzgeber and Rusty perform their 1999 World Cup freestyle.”
Qualities you look for in a horse:
”A fabulous walk and I like them to be sharp, but not spooky. My horses need to be forward going as I don’t have much use of my legs.”
Favourite competition venues:
“Beaver Hall, it’s 10mins from my home.”
What other career would you have chosen?
“Something to do with animals or something in motor racing, definitely not anything to do with paperwork, which I’m allergic to.”
Favourite meal:
"Chicken Korma ready meals or beans and cheese on toast, but the cheese must be melted into the
beans.”
Favourite drink :
"I love Bailey’s, otherwise a cup of tea or a chocolate milkshake. To stay hydrated - I don’t like water - so I buy lots of Aldi’s squash or Ribena.”
Best advice you’ve ever been given:
“Don’t get on a horse, which I ignored."
Who would you most like to have dinner with:
"Anybody sexy, rich and interesting”
Ideal holiday:
“Anywhere with the above….. Lanzorote was one of my best holidays, anywhere close to the beach will do!”
Favourite TV programme:
Ugly Betty.
Favourite book:
Horse and Hound ("that’s as close I get to a book").
Favourite film:
Pricilla Queen of the Desert or Pretty Women.
Favourite band/singer:
Whatever is on the radio.