Carl Hester

Speaker 40:01

BBC Sounds, Music, Radio, Podcasts.

Presenter0:04

Hello, I'm Lauren Laverne and this is the Desert Island Discs podcast. Every week I ask my guests to choose the eight tracks, book and luxury they'd want to take with them if they were castaway to a desert island. And, for rights reasons, the music is shorter than the original broadcast. I hope you enjoy listening.

Presenter0:42

My castaway this week is the dressage rider Carl Hester. A groundbreaking Olympian, he brought home the first ever British gold medal for dressage with his teammates at the London 2012 Olympics. He was the youngest British rider ever to compete when he took part in his first Games in 1992. This year, at 54, he was the most senior British Olympian in Tokyo, winning a team bronze medal, and he hopes to be at the next Olympics in Paris. His three Olympic medals sit alongside many other international prizes and accolades, including a British Horse Show Queen's Award and an MBE for services to equestrianism.

Presenter1:20

His path to glory in this elite world was far from typical, however. He grew up on Sark in the Channel Islands, a car free landmass just two miles square, where horses are a mode of transport so although he made his name by mastering the art of the most precise form of horsemanship, a sport he has likened to gymnastics, he started out riding a donkey, and earning pocket money taking tourists around the island in a horse drawn carriage.

Presenter1:46

He says The thrill, the joy, the satisfaction, and sometimes the frustration of this sport for me is in bringing horses up and their journey from being promising untried youngsters to expressing their talents and personalities. Carl Hester, welcome to Desert Island Discs.

Carl Hester2:03

Thank you.

Presenter2:04

So-called dressage's origins go back centuries, but the sport itself can look pretty out there to the untrained eye. So you've got half a tonne's worth of horse jogging on the spot, performing an elegant piaff in the technical terminology. It's a strange thing for a person to get a horse to do, but is that relationship between the rider and the horse all part of the attraction for you?

Carl Hester2:26

Yes, it is. They are like people. They do have their own personalities and finding which ones want to work, which ones are able to be changed, because all shapes and sizes can get to an Olympic level or certainly to Grand Prix level, which is the pinnacle of the sport. And it's just great over the years. You know, I can think of the amount of horses that we've started with in the yard and we've said this one's never going to make it and this one doesn't have this and doesn't have that. And it's always the way when you don't want them, no one else does. So you end up pushing through. Sometimes it'll take until you know eight or nine years old before we actually can say, yes, this one is certainly got a long future ahead of him as a dressage horse.

Speaker 12:42

One.

Presenter3:08

As a dress.

Presenter3:10

Carl, you're sharing your music with us today, and of course music is an integral part of your sport. What do you listen out for when you're choosing a piece for competition?

Carl Hester3:19

You need a very good beat. I mean, you have the three different paces of the horse, the walk, the trot and the canter. So that has to match their footfalls. And it's good when you compose a program that it does actually tell a story. It shouldn't just be three different choices that don't actually join together.

Presenter3:38

We'll start then with disc number one. What's it going to be?

Carl Hester3:41

Castles by Freya Ridings. When I ride in the mornings, we have the radio playing, and sometimes when you might be struggling a little bit with your schooling session, and suddenly a song comes on that just has a really good beat to it, that really lifts you out and really like helps the horse move more, it helps me ride better. And this was one of them when it came out. And I just used every time it came on, my poor horse had to suffer it going up to top notch on the volume button, and off I'd go, and it always seemed to go better to this particular track.

Speaker 44:18

The target

Speaker 44:20

You get that rush, and then you walk out the door. You can't be small, that's what you want to.

Speaker 44:28

I never know that.

Speaker 44:32

You held my hand into the darkness. I didn't care. It made me just want you more. My God, your love, it seems so harmless. I never know that.

Presenter4:48

Castles by the appropriately named Freya Ridings. So Carl Hester, at the London 2012 Olympics you were part of the British dressage team that clinched the gold medal, a terrific achievement in an event that had been dominated for decades by Germany. I wonder what your most enduring memory is of those games.

Carl Hester5:08

I don't think I've ever been that close to such an enormous audience. We had 25,000 people down there at Greenwich to watch the dressage and

Carl Hester5:18

That for me was an incredible feeling in itself that the sport had actually not only for the people that love it, but for people that didn't actually know anything about dressage. And I was just really excited they were coming to see a sport that was a bit bizarre, perhaps to a lot of people that don't know what it is. I was just so excited that we were able to show that. And of course, the atmosphere of London 2012 was incredibly happy. And that just rubbed off on all of us.

Presenter5:48

You weren't just a rider at London twenty twelve, you were also a trainer. Your dressage teammate, Charlotte Dejardin, was one of your pupils on the dancing horse Vallegro. She won a gold medal for the individual dressage, and you trained Vallegro, too. What made him so special?

Carl Hester6:04

Yeah, you hear so many stories about brilliant horses at the top that were very difficult when they were in their younger years. Vallegro never was. He was always a professor from the age of four. He was easy to break in. He understood all the things we asked of him. And I think where he was so different, where he's able to be a completely normal pony club type of horse. So, you know, not only when Charlotte gets on him does he immediately know that what he has to do and at what level he performs at. He is the ultimate and was the ultimate athlete.

Carl Hester6:42

But we also have, you know, children coming to the yard who have been terminally ill, for instance, and they are able to.

Carl Hester6:49

Cuddle him, pat him, sit on him. I can lead them around on him.

Carl Hester6:54

And he's just done so many good things for so many people and he still does. People come and visit him at home on a regular basis just to touch him, pat him. He has his own statue in our local town of Newant. It gives me great pleasure when I drive past there, if I'm on my way to the co-op to get the Sunday shopping, and I see a lot of children sitting on the statue or just being there, being photographed with him. And I just think, what an incredible horse. You know, he, as he said, I think he's.

Speaker 17:12

Bye.

Carl Hester7:22

Well known to a lot of people that aren't horsey, just that name.

Presenter7:26

Carl, it's time for your second piece of music today. What's it gonna be?

Carl Hester7:29

I'm going to have Sarah Brightman Fleur de Mal, and this is because this was part of my music composition, the dressage of music, at the London twenty twelve Olympics.

Presenter8:12

Sarah Brightman and Fleur de Mar.

Presenter8:14

Carl Hester, you were born in nineteen sixty seven. Your mum, Brenda, was very young when she had you. Still at school, in fact. In those days girls in that situation were often sent away to have their babies. Was she?

Carl Hester8:26

My grandmother was definitely somebody who would be described as what would the neighbors think? And I know when my mum became pregnant, she was taken back to school and they were asked to announce it at assembly.

Carl Hester8:42

In front of the school.

Speaker 48:44

Oh wow.

Carl Hester8:44

Which I think must have obviously been pretty difficult for her at the time. The headmaster then took her to one side after this had happened and took my mum for a walk round the school playing fields and then asked her after she'd had the baby whether she would like to come back and continue her A-levels. She said she would love to do that and he said he would have to consult with the other teachers and if it was a majority then she could come back, which thankfully as it happened, she was allowed to go back. She was then sent to live with a social worker that was organised by social services to have me in Cambridge.

Carl Hester9:28

And um that's where life started. She then came back home again and I know that my grandfather was a big part of making sure that I wasn't put up for adoption and that my mother could keep me and they would uh look after me at home.

Speaker 49:31

Yeah.

Presenter9:45

You were born in Cambridge then, that was where your mum had you, but you'd spent your early life in London with her family. And then when you were four, she moved to Sark, so that's the fourth smallest Channel Island, I believe. Do you remember your first impressions of the place? You were obviously very little.

Carl Hester10:01

I do a little bit actually. What had actually happened was I suffered a lot from pneumonia in my early years, before the age of four. The doctor suggested that I would be better not living in a city and to try and get out into the country.

Speaker 410:14

Hmm.

Carl Hester10:15

Mm-hmm.

Carl Hester10:16

My grandparents had visited Sark and had made friends with a wonderful named lady called Winnie Tosh. And she left a one-bedroom wooden chalet to my mother and her two brothers. So my mother decided to take me to live on Sark and I remember arriving on the island and if you haven't been there as you say it's very small it's three and a half miles by one and a half it's incredibly peaceful and beautiful horses and carriages and bikes are your transport or foot and I remember going up to touch my first horse in those days and I just remember it took a mouthful of my hair and me crying and running back to my mother.

Presenter11:01

But it didn't put you off in the long run.

Carl Hester11:02

I love them from the word go and I couldn't wait to spend time.

Carl Hester11:06

On the horses and carriages with all the drivers. I would go from carriage to carriage as a very small boy. I loved Sark. I still do.

Carl Hester11:14

Did it shape you, you think? I think actually going to boarding school, that is what shaped me. I think I probably would never have pushed myself if I stayed on Sark, because of course I would have stayed there and done what most people who live there do. You know, I would have continued working in the hotels. I took my license, driving a horse and carriage so that I could drive tourists around. Very funny driving tests, by the way. Two policemen sat behind me in a carriage and sat with me while we drove around for half an hour, had a chat. I did a little bit of reversing, got given a certificate. The funny thing is, with my boarding school at the time at Elizabeth College, it sits in St Peterport, Guernsey, at the head of a hill. And from my dormitory window, I could see the nine miles across the sea to Sark. So it kind of felt cruel because we were never allowed home until the holidays. Every day, even though I was at boarding school, I was still looking at the island where my mother and father were living.

Presenter12:09

I want to come to that in a minute, but for now we've got to get to your next piece of music. It's disc number three. What are we going to hear and why?

Carl Hester12:17

This is the first song I ever remember. This is Melanie and Brand New Key. And I remember when my mother had married my stepfather, Jess Onsark. And I just remember sitting on the floor at a very young age. And this record was obviously their favourite. Melanie got played again and again and again. And to listen to this record. Especially the bit about roller skates, which I always wanted to do and go on and be able to roller skate. This record certainly reminds me of that.

Speaker 412:53

I rode my bicycle past your window last night.

Speaker 412:59

I roll the skate into your door at daylight.

Speaker 413:04

It almost seems

Speaker 413:07

It's like you're avoiding me.

Speaker 413:10

I'm okay alone, but you got something I need. Well, I got a brand new pair of seats, you got a brand new key.

Presenter13:22

Melanie and Brand New Key.

Presenter13:24

So Carl Hester, your mum met your stepfather Jess while she was working at a hotel in Sark. He was a carpenter there. What was your relationship like with him?

Carl Hester13:33

They were still very young when they met and married on Sark, but just adopted me, which is how I became Hester. I was brought up then with my half brother and sister. And we all got on as a family, I have to say. It was a nice

Carl Hester13:49

cosy home to be in. But the older I got, the more I appreciated, of course, what had been done for me by my stepfather. I look back at it now and I I just feel so grateful that they did manage in those days to put up money for me to get an education. That was very important for them that I got one.

Presenter14:02

Ma

Presenter14:09

Tell me a little bit more about what you were like as a young boy, because I think when you were just eight you had a summer job taking tourists around the island in a horse drawn carriage, and you would be explaining the island's history to them. So that tells me that you must have had a pretty good memory and a lot of self confidence at that age.

Carl Hester14:25

They loved having, you know, a cheeky little kid telling them how it was and what all these things were and then you know holding the hand out like a little urchin at the end of the day for a bit of money on it.

Presenter14:37

Did you get to keep the cash? What did you spend?

Carl Hester14:38

I did actually get to keep the cash. We used to do all sorts of ingenious things, you know, and then with the donkey that I did ride there, we used to take the donkey down to the beach and we would charge the other kids, you know, like five pence to come and have a sit on him, and I would lead them up and down. The island itself is a very high plateau, so they're not beaches. You know, when you think of donkey rides at Blackpool or something, it's not like that. These are very steep.

Speaker 114:57

Mm.

Carl Hester15:01

It's a plateau island, so the steps down or the paths down to these beaches are incredibly steep. So it would take us quite a long time to get Jacko the donkey down there. So that must have.

Presenter15:11

So that must have honed your skills for balance and control.

Carl Hester15:14

I think it did. Now, the difference, of course, growing up, starting to ride on Sark is you occasionally, if you were lucky, had a bridle, but you very rarely had a saddle. So, if you've ever sat on a horse without a saddle, it's a pretty slippy feeling, and you do need to learn balance. Riding without a saddle certainly gives you core strength. And we used to do a lot of that. And we used to gallop around the cliff paths. And I look at it now when I go back there, and I think, how did we ever get away without having an accident? All it would have needed was a horse to slip, and you could have gone straight over a 200-foot cliff. But you don't, of course, have that sort of fear when you're young. But it's certainly where I learned about balance.

Presenter16:02

It's time for disc number four. What have you chosen?

Carl Hester16:05

So my next choice is racy some girls.

Carl Hester16:09

And when I was at boarding school, we had what were called dens, and dens were like in the bows of the college, right down in the bottom corridors. And they didn't have windows, or if they did, you were just looking really into the main shaft of the college. But they were rooms where each of your year group could go to. So you could play music, you could play games, you could just chill out. You had a bean bag, and you had a tuck box. And in some cases, we had a record player. And Racy and Some Girls was the first record I ever bought.

Speaker 416:50

Some girls will

Speaker 416:53

Some girls want

Speaker 416:55

Some girls need a lot of love and never, some girls don't.

Speaker 116:56

Smeel

Speaker 417:01

Well I know I've got the fever but I don't know why.

Speaker 417:06

Some say they will and some girls like

Speaker 417:11

So here I am in front of you, not really knowing

Presenter17:16

Racy and some girls. So Carl Hester, working with horses was your childhood dream. What happened when it was time to leave school? Did you have a plan to make it happen?

Carl Hester17:28

When I was at college and I'd done my O-levels, I went to visit the careers officer and the careers officer said, what do you want to do?

Carl Hester17:35

So I said I'd like to be a jockey. I was still quite small then. I didn't really grow until I was about 17. So I would have been about five, six. So certainly would have looked the part at that age. And for whatever reason, I didn't get in. And then I had a telephone call from my old teacher in Sark. And she said to me, Look, Carl, I remember you saying that you wanted a career in horses. She said, there's a lady here who has a holiday house on Sark. And she has a riding center in the New Forest called the Fortune Centre, the Therapy Centre for Disabled Teenagers. And they would love to talk to you if they could help you. And they offered me a chance to go there to take my exam. So at least I had a qualification that I could teach, which was the British Horse Society. And that was how it started, really.

Presenter18:27

It was also around this time that you reconnected with your biological father. How did that go? It was on the way to the Fortune Centre for your first trip there, I think, that you went to visit him.

Carl Hester18:37

Yes, it was. When I was growing up and I was at boarding school, my mother would occasionally call me at school and she would say, if you watch such and such a programme tonight, your father's going to be on telly because my father went into acting. And he starred in a lot of mainstream TV at the time, Coronation Street and Morse and Tales of the Unexpected, you know, some of those greats, you know, that we all used to watch all the time. And so she said, if you watch it this time tonight, you will see what your father looks like.

Speaker 119:03

You know that

Carl Hester19:11

And then when I came to England, she thought it would be a good idea to take me to meet him.

Presenter19:18

So just to go back, Carl, how did you spot him? So were you watching these shows looking for someone who looked like you? He he became the actor Tony Smee.

Carl Hester19:18

So just to go back.

Carl Hester19:25

She would give me the name of the character that he would play, so that that would help me. But we, of course, had common rooms. I was at boarding school. So, very often, when you were watching TV, there would be anything from, you know, like eight to 25 boys in a common room trying to watch television. And not everybody wanted to watch the same thing. But I would always insist on those nights that, you know, please, please, please, could we just watch this program? Because I wanted to see what my father looked like and to show my friends as well. So that's how I first saw him on the television. Then, when I came to England, we flew to London. My mum had arranged for us to meet. And he was then married again to, thankfully, a lovely lady called Mary Louise, who was Swiss. And they had a daughter, Vivian, who is my other half-sister. And we turned up at the flat in Chiswick. And I was very, very nervous. I really remember that day very well, like standing, you know, like hoping my mother would not leave me on my own and knocking at the door. And Mary Louise answered. But she was one of those people that put me so at ease straight away. And we sat down and chatted. And I said, Well, what shall I call him when he walks in? Do I call him dad or do I call him Tony? And she said, Just call him Tony.

Carl Hester20:43

So the door opened eventually and my father walked in and I said, Good afternoon, Tony and that was how we reconnected again. It's all good and I think, you know, looking back at how it all started, I think everybody in my situation, or particularly their situation, you know, did the best they could.

Presenter21:05

It's time for some more music, Carl. Number five. What are we going to hear?

Carl Hester21:09

Brian Ferry's slave to love. It's a a beautiful

Carl Hester21:13

Song, but it also has some incredible lyrics in it. And I just remember in my moody teens just listening to Brian Ferry all the time. It seemed to have that perfect mix for me: some of it was crazy and dance stuff, and then this just puts me in a really sleepy, soft mood.

Speaker 421:34

Tenear one

Speaker 421:39

You got to know

Speaker 421:42

Let's do it when we

Speaker 421:44

Yeah.

Speaker 421:46

Give you the strength of my heart.

Speaker 421:53

Slave to love.

Speaker 422:02

Yeah.

Presenter22:06

Brian Ferry and Slave to Love. So, Carl Hester, you competed in your first Olympics in 1992. You were the youngest British rider to do so, an incredible achievement. I know that you've said that that event changed the course of your life. How so?

Carl Hester22:20

Even at the age of twenty I was still thinking I can't

Carl Hester22:24

go on earning no money. I've got to find a way to get to the next stage. And

Carl Hester22:29

The Bechtelsimer family were offering a job. They had a German rider. They're based here in the UK. And they were the most successful team that we had in the UK, up and coming. And they decided to take a young British rider on. So I was contacted by our selectors who would pick young riders for teams. And they said, there is a job going, and we would like to send you for an interview. The Germans have led the world of dressage for so long, so I knew that there was a huge wealth of knowledge there. And that's how I went, and I got the job. I'd only been there eight months, and I'd never ridden at the top level. So eight months later, I find myself at my first world championship, a year later, my first European Championship. And then having been there.

Carl Hester23:20

until ninety two, uh three years, then uh my first Olympics. And I just seemed to have, you know, for myself, for my own um satisfaction there, just seemed to have put myself in a position that I now could finally make a career myself without having to rely on other people.

Presenter23:36

We need to make time for some more music calls, so it's track number six. What's next?

Carl Hester23:41

I've picked Barcelona by Montserrat Caballe and Freddie Mercury and this is because of course it does remind me of being in Barcelona. It reminds me of the opening ceremony, my first opening ceremony and we were held in a holding pen. All the athletes, the whole world was happy. All the athletes from all round the world were

Carl Hester24:04

going through one at a time and I had never experienced such an enormous situation and then to be in the main arena and see this song performed on a hot summer's night in Barcelona just brings back incredible memories for me.

Speaker 424:35

God will

Speaker 424:38

He's a girl.

Speaker 424:44

So good.

Presenter24:50

Barcelona, Montserrat Cavalier and Freddie Mercury. Carl, do the skills that you've learned as a horseman come in handy in other areas of your life?

Carl Hester24:58

They do help a lot in running a business. With dressage being about detail, it's also about presentation. In my first job with the Bechtel Seimers, it was a very regimented way of working. The hours that we did, the presentation, the yard always had to be so immaculate that if anybody ever walked onto it, it would look like it would do at the end of the day when we finished it. So, even in the working hours, it always had to be superbly presented. The bandages that the horses were ridden in had to be ironed, the rugs that they wore also had to be ironed. Such detail. I had never seen anything like this. This was so far removed from my lifestyle on Sark, which was you might, if you were lucky, skim a quick brush over it before you got on a road. You never wore a hat, you never wore breeches or boots, you wore a pair of jeans, often barefoot. And it was just so I couldn't quite believe what I was seeing, you know, but the detail.

Carl Hester25:56

It helped me so much.

Presenter25:57

Time's some more music, I think, called Number 7. What are we going to hear and why have you chosen it?

Carl Hester26:02

Noel Harrison, Windmills of My Mind. Now in my career I've been fortunate to meet lots of interesting different people. There are so many in the horse world from different backgrounds and in this case a friend of mine from the past that used to event, Harriet Harrison, and her father was Noel Harrison and she went on, got married, has two children, two well two grown-up boys now. They're my godsons. We love spending time together. We basically sit round the house and whenever we've had too much to drink, this is the song that we sing very badly.

Speaker 426:40

Around like a circle in a spiral, like a wheel within a wheel, Never ending or beginning on a never-spinning reel, Like a snowball down a mountain, or a carnival balloon, Like a carousel that's turning, running rings around the moon, Like a clock whose hands are sweeping past the minutes of its face, And the world is like an apple, whirling silently in space, Like the circles that you find

Speaker 427:07

In the windmills of your mind, like a tunnel that

Presenter27:11

Noel Harrison and the Windmills of Your Mind. So Carl Hester, after much hard work you finally got your own stables and you're there today. Your horses there rub along with many other animals, including five peacocks, twenty three guinea fowl, twelve hens and a cockatoo, as far as I understand. How do they all get on?

Carl Hester27:30

It's a madhouse, isn't it? They all get on fine. I think it's the people that come to my house and yard that don't find it quite so easy because they all live wild. So when I'm teaching or

Carl Hester27:44

Somebody's having a lesson, they can be in the middle of what they consider to be a very

Carl Hester27:49

complicated, complex move. And the next thing is twenty three guinea fowl run across the arena in front of them screaming and cackling. The birds make me feel like I'm in a paradise, to be honest.

Presenter28:00

And is there a kind of another side to that menagerie that you've got going on? Because presumably if you're practising dressage, and I know that you have these kind of Olympic sized training areas as part of your stables, if there are distractions and other animals going on and the horses learn to deal with that, that will benefit you in competition, won't it?

Carl Hester28:19

Of course it will. That's a very good point. And I think London, particularly looking back at that Olympics, you know, going down that chute into that arena was literally spine tingling with the noise, especially the crowds were making for the British riders. And we were just so fortunate that our horses seemed to accept it, to be trained, to stay relaxed, because dressage is about a relaxed performance. And of course, many of these situations make them so tense that then they become unridable and you cannot show your best performance.

Presenter28:51

How are you feeling about Paris 2024? Are you looking forward to it? Your next Olympics?

Carl Hester28:57

I'm hoping to go there. I mean, I do realize now, of course, there's lots of people snapping at my heels. Only three riders will get to go. So it's certainly not a given that I will be competing there. I've got my heart set on it. I would love to get another Olympics and help the team again. I have to say, this is the first time after a major competition. And we've had two major championships this year in the Olympics and Europeans. But this is the first time I've actually finished those championships. And instead of saying, oh, I wish I didn't have to do this anymore, I am thinking, I really would love to go and do one more. And Paris is only a stone's throw away compared to the traveling I've done with horses in the past. I've competed in Sydney, Athens, Tokyo. You know, they've been major hikes for the horses, which are our partners at the end of the day. That Paris seems like it's going to be a very reasonable Olympics.

Presenter29:50

Of course I'm about to cast you away. How will you get on, do you think? How do you manage in your own company?

Carl Hester29:56

I'm not good in my own company. I can't think of a lot worse than being left on my own, even with all those lovely gifts. Yeah, it would be well, I wouldn't be able to be rescued, would I? So I just have to get used to it, I suppose.

Presenter30:09

Do you think you might try and escape?

Carl Hester30:11

If there was a way of escaping, yes, that would be me.

Presenter30:15

One more disc before we send you there then, Carl. What's it going to be and why are you taking this with you today?

Carl Hester30:20

It's basically the the song that never gets tired. I am pretty obsessive when I find a song that I love and I do tend to play it endlessly and endlessly until finally I can't bear it any longer. Whereas this song, which is Kim Khan's Betty Davis Eyes, just never gets boring and I'm never tired of it.

Speaker 430:45

Her hair is hollow gold

Speaker 430:50

They left sweet surprise

Speaker 430:54

Her hands are never cold

Speaker 430:58

She's got better days inside, she'll turn her music on you

Speaker 431:04

You won't have to think twice.

Speaker 431:08

She's pure as New York snow

Speaker 431:12

She got bad a day to sign

Presenter31:15

Kim Carnes and Betty Davis Eyes. So, Carl Hester, it's time to cast you away to your island. You know all about island life, of course, of as we've been hearing. Do you picture a place a bit like Sark?

Carl Hester31:27

Oh, I wish it was. Of course things change, but it's still the beautiful gem, and if it was Leitzark I would be very happy.

Presenter31:36

You'll need to use all your survival skills to keep yourself going, of course. How will you fare when it comes to that, do you think?

Carl Hester31:42

I am used to rugged life from being there. As long as I had people on it, I'd be quite happy to be there tomorrow.

Presenter31:49

No people, I'm afraid. You will have the company of the books, of course, that you can take with you: the Bible and the complete works of Shakespeare.

Carl Hester31:54

Yeah.

Presenter31:57

And a book of your choice. What will that be?

Carl Hester32:00

This is a book that I got given for my 50th birthday from my dad on Sark, and it's called The Centenary Book of Sark. And it's a book that's a work of art that contains works of art. And they are landscapes by William Topless, who used to live there. And when I looked through this book of Sark,

Carl Hester32:21

It just makes me realize how fortunate I was to be brought up there.

Presenter32:26

Well, you can definitely have that, your island on the desert island with you. You can also have a luxury item. What would you like?

Carl Hester32:32

Being in the sport that I'm in, I mean, it has meant sort of over the years it has chipped away at my back. So it's got better as I've got older.

Carl Hester32:42

Because of the exercises I do to help that and the way I've learnt to carry myself better. But the one thing that changed my life was a pillow and a special pillow that how it supports my head and neck and shoulders. And this pillow has already been around the world with me. I am quite forgetful. So I have left it in New Zealand. I've left it in Australia. I've left it in Canada. I've left it in America. And it's got more air miles than me.

Presenter33:13

That well travelled pillow will be your welcome companion. I'm sure it's yours. Finally, Carl, if you could only save one disc from being swept away out to sea, which of the eight that you've shared with us today would you choose?

Carl Hester33:19

Finally called

Carl Hester33:27

It would have to be Betty Davis' eyes. However hungry I was, however I wished that there was a bar on the island, if I played this, it would certainly relax me and I would be very happy.

Presenter33:40

Carl Hester, thank you very much for letting us hear your Desert Island discs.

Carl Hester33:45

Thank you very much for having me.

Presenter34:00

I hope you enjoyed that interview with Carl and I hope he's comfortable with his pillow.

Presenter34:04

We have many castaways from the equestrian world in our Desert Island Discs archive, including the jockeys Frankie DiTori and Peter Scudamore and the horse trainers Mark Johnston and Jenny Pittman. Hear their programmes by searching through BBC Sounds or on our programme website. Join me next time when I'll be talking to the writer Neil Gaiman.

Speaker 134:36

Harland, a new five-part supernatural thriller for BBC Radio 4.

Speaker 434:41

Welcome to Haaland, town of the future. Things happen here sometimes, especially at night. The past does not exist here. Police in Haaland have appealed for the public's help with the investigation into the disappearance of local teenager Evie Bennett. It's been concreted over and forgotten.

Presenter34:57

The worst of it is still to come. This is only the b

Speaker 434:59

She's right. It wants to suck me down into the void and destroy me.

Speaker 435:03

Not just me, everything. I'm the only one here at night. Well what if it comes for me next? If you really want to understand something, you have to go right to the edge. What is it? Is it something real?

Speaker 435:16

It's coming towards you. Sarah! It's right there in front of you. Sarah!

Speaker 135:22

Harland, available on B B C Sounds.