King Charles is often forthcoming with useful bits of advice, and on one such occasion a royal reporter admitted that “just the thought” of following his advice was “painful”
King Charles gave a royal reporter a crucial piece of advice – but she admits just the thought of guidance was “painful”. Behind his seemingly stern persona, the monarch has a keen sense of humour. He also has a number of interests outside of his royal duties.
One of them is horse riding. Charles was a keen amateur jockey in his younger years, riding in six races between 1980 and 1981.
This past life led him to give some nuggets of advice to The Sunday Times’ Royal Editor Roya Nikkhah. Next weekend she is racing at York racecourse to raise money for Macmillan Cancer Support, a charity of which the King is patron.
She called the training “the most challenging, intense experience” of my life. She has been training in Lambourn, Berkshire, where the King trained in his younger days.
When Charles visited York Hospital to open the new Sir Robert Ogden Macmillan Cancer Centre, he passed on some royal fitness tips before the gets into the saddle on the big day. Some of them were more palatable than others.
Writing in The Sunday Times, Roya said: “When I told the King that many of my early mornings – alarm at 4am, 90-minute drive and riding by 7am – are currently spent training on the Lambourn gallops, his eyes lit up. I remember doing that, long ago. Keep going with the training.”
He then proceeded to give Roya the royal fitness tip. “‘You’re riding so short [stirrups], it’s about the most exhausting thing I’ve ever done.
“So what I found, was to really improve your fitness and to get your legs really strong, [for] riding short – the best thing for it is to ride a bicycle without the saddle, no seat. It really works.’ Just the thought was painful.”
Roya admitted that she was yet to try out Charles’s tip, although she did pass the gruelling ‘jockey fitness test’.
On Saturday (June 13), instead of attending Trooping the Colour, she will be racing over a mile and a furlong alongside 10 other amateur jockeys in the Macmillan Ride of their Lives charity.
Meanwhile, Prince Harry’s long-awaited reunion with his dad could be on the cards when he visits the UK for an Invictus Games event this summer – but only if certain rules are followed.
Royal author Ingrid Seward tells the Mirror the King could still extend an invitation to Harry, Meghan and their children Prince Archie and Princess Lilibet, aged seven and four, if Harry is willing to agree to and follow certain rules.
She said: “The only place that really I think they could meet if the King is to get to know or at least see his grandchildren, is at Balmoral. It’s the only time the King has time and the Sussexes could be accommodated there because there’s lots of cottages on the Estate.”
