Alex Bragg

A late starter who took an unorthodox route into eventing, the five-star event rider’s life experiences nonetheless prepared him well. Pippa Roome meets him

- Pippa Roome

ALEX BRAGG is proof that you don’t have to tread the beaten path through under-21 teams to make it as an event rider.

When his peers were collecting junior medals, he was an apprentice farrier and semi-professional rugby player. When they were taking tentative steps beyond the young rider bubble, he was a newly-wed with a baby on the way. When they were trying their first five-stars in their mid-twenties, he was unable to get a horse on the bit.

“I don’t think if you’d seen me ride 15 years ago, you’d ever have imagined I’d be going round a five-star – I was pretty bad,” he laughs. “I had these massive shoulders and neck, from playing rugby, and I rode like a silverback gorilla, going down the centre line with my elbows out.

“My wife Simmone and I spent hours out in the field, her trying to teach me how to get a horse soft. I’d just try to pull its head in – that’s what you did when you played rugby, you made stuff happen. She’d get on, wriggle the reins a bit and the horse would go beautifully. I’d get on and he’d look petrified.”

Fast forward 16 years and Alex, now 40, has been British reserve for two European Championships and is seventh in the world rankings.

There is luck in every story, but Alex’s success is surely largely down to the force of his character. He is friendly, eloquent and funny, but also a passionate team-builder and ultra motivated – “this whole ethos about trying to be a better person, trying to have a better life, trying to make our time here the best it possibly can be”, as he puts it, making this sound inspiring rather than cheesy.