A Change in the Saddle: The Charles Family (6/6)
Throughout the season, and just as it does every year, the CHIG newsletter is bringing you a series of articles on a specific theme. The focus for 2025 is jumping’s new generation of riders, the sons and daughters of, who are making it not because of who they are but because of what they can do. In this, the sixth and final episode, we focus on the Charles family and their two Olympic champions.
To read the first issues of our series on equestrian dynasties, click here:
Episode 1 : Bryan and Mike Smits
Episode 2 : Gilles Thomas and Marc van Dijck
Episode 3 : Richard and Harry Meade
Olympic gold in the blood
It’s a dream for many but a reality for only a few. Becoming an Olympic champion is hard enough but to do it 12 years after your father achieved the same feat is rarer still. Yet, that is what Harry Charles did at Paris 2024, picking up where his father Peter left off at London 2012.
Now regarded as one of the best riders in the world, Harry had quite a role model to inspire him when he was growing up. While it cannot be easy to follow in the footsteps of an Olympic champion, in the Charles family at least, the handover from father to son was as natural as they come, combining as it did professionalism, trust and the very British sense of humour that the two have always shared.
Over the years, Harry has learned to blaze his own trail, while still managing to cultivate the unique sporting heritage that binds him to his father Peter. What is more, the world No.36 is very much settled at his family’s base on the south coast of England and has no plans to leave his loved ones any time soon. “I’ve thought about it, obviously, but ultimately what I’ve got here works,” he explains. “I’ve got the support of people who just want me to succeed and who give me the best possible backing. And if there’s ever a time when I need a second opinion, then I can go with my horses and pay Scott Brash a visit. He’s about an hour away and he always welcomes me with open arms.”
Team spirit is alive and well in the British ranks, as evidenced by last summer’s Olympic team gold in Paris. With mainstays Brash and Ben Maher alongside him, Harry Charles was one of the architects of Team GB’s first win in the event since 2012 on home soil, when Peter Charles teamed up with Brash, Maher and the legendary Nick Skelton to claim gold. “He was the first person I thought of and I threw my arms around him,” recalls Harry. “The strange thing is, though, that the more time passes, the happier that memory makes me. Maybe it’s taken a while for what happened to sink in.”
A choice to be made
Rather than be a burden, having an Olympic champion in the family became a constant source of support for Harry. His father has never sought to impose a certain way of doing things on him, choosing instead to offer a framework, a viewpoint and the intuition that only experienced riders can get across. The talk at home, therefore, is about technical details or feelings in the saddle. There are no diktats and no pressure. “We’ve always worked like that,” explains Harry. “He gives his opinion, but he’s never forced me to follow a particular path. It just happens naturally.”
When he was younger, the 26-year-old Harry was split between riding and golf: “I was better on the green than in the saddle, but I didn’t really enjoy it all that much. I didn’t really have friends, and it was a pretty solitary sport. My father told me at the time not to do things by half, that I had to make a choice if I wanted to continue doing one of them. So, at 13 I chose horses.”
It was a decision he has not regretted, even though he admits to enjoying golf again: “It would be nice if I could get my game back, though (laughs).” Harry’s father was naturally delighted with his choice, as he explains: “I think for him an ideal day would be being at home with my sisters and me and watching us ride. He still likes to ride three or four horses a week, but they’re all fairly young because he’s got into breeding over these last few years. That’s great for us too, to be able to establish a bond with them from the moment they’re born through to riding them in 5* events.”
Fatherly advice
Appreciative of how fortunate he has been to grow up with an Olympic champion, Harry has flourished in the environment his parents have created, kicking on to make his mark on the international stage. Peter’s role now is to observe, advise and reassure. The decisions are Harry’s to make as he continues to forge his career in the elite. They communicate in a way that is simple, direct and devoid of any artifice. And there is more, much more, to their family heritage than just medals. For them, sport is a question of commitment, humility and a real feeling for horses.
“The biggest thing I’ve learned from him is to be patient,” says Harry. “He’s always told me to surround myself with good people too. When I was younger, for example, I was jealous of other children my age because they could jump higher with their ponies. I wanted to go faster than them. But my father always said to me, ‘When you’re ready, you’ll feel it, and that’s when you’ll make the most progress’. And he was right, of course (laughs). When the time came to move on to the next stages, it was all so much easier, obviously, because I’d trained hard for it. And I never felt nervous either, even when I made my Grand Prix 5* debut. And then there’s all the ground work you have to do with horses, getting them to go straight, forwards, backwards, to the right, to the left. If you master those tools and listen to your horse as they listen to you, then you’ve got the foundations for everything that comes next, and you start to become one with them.”
While that recipe for success might sound simple, the British rider has put an awful lot of work into his achievements, albeit with the help of others, a point he does not tire of making. Newly married this last summer, he has almost everything he ever wished for – almost everything: “Winning a Rolex Grand Prix would pretty much be the ultimate. I’ve always dreamed about it.” Perhaps that dream will come true in few short weeks’ time at the Geneva arena he loves so much.
Aurore Favre
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