A HUDDERSFIELD couple have triumphed at a horse show that professional horse owners have tried for decades to win.

And the triple success means the horse’s value has shot up and she is now worth a six figure sum.

Amateur riders Nikki and Chris Lawton, of Longwood, bought the chestnut horse, Dancing Queen, three years ago after Nikki’s previous horse threw her off three times.

They entered Dancer, as she is known in the stables, for the British Hanoverian Horse Society Annual Show at Addington Manor Equestrian Centre in Buckingham.

Dancer won the prestigious Guardian Cup for the best six to nine-year-old mare, then went on to win the cup for champion mare and was finally crowned Supreme Champion.

“It is all so exciting – I can’t believe it,” said 48-year-old Nikki. “I keep thinking it is a fairy story and then I look at all the cups on the mantelpiece and realise it’s true.”

What is even more remarkable is that the couple are both amateur riders. Nikki is a pharmacist for NHS Kirklees and Chris is an engineer.

Around the country there are professional horsemen and women who have been trying to win the Supreme Champion title for 30 years and yet not succeeded.

At the show, horses were led through their paces and not ridden.

Nikki learned to ride at the Whitaker family stables at Outlane. She stopped riding for 20 years and only took it up again about eight years ago.

“As soon as I saw Dancing Queen I thought she was absolutely gorgeous,” she said. “After a couple of minutes riding her I felt instantly safe, which was really good after the bad experience I’d had with the other horse.”

“I took her back into the stable and she put her head on my shoulder. I knew she was the horse for me.”