Endurance rider and horse breeder Chris Wray from Cwmcarvan near Raglan has bred the highest ever scoring endurance horse in a national young horse evaluation day.

Chris’ colt foal, Kamili (Shuawaiman Al Rais x Cloud Stepper) gained his score in the Baileys Horse Feeds/ British Breeding/British Equestrian Federation (BEF) Futurity at Hartpury College on Tuesday (August 23).

Kamili - which appropriately means ‘complete’ or ‘perfect’ in Swahili - scored an elite premium of 9.25 out of a possible maximum of 10.

An elite Futurity premium indicates that the horse has the potential and outlook to perform at international level.

Chris said, “This result is just fantastic, I was stunned to discover when I got home from Hartpury that Kamili has gained the highest Futurity score ever awarded to an endurance horse. Futurity evaluator Jo Claridge said Kamili is extremely nice and has great potential.”

Kamili is the latest in a line of horses bred by Chris and his mother, Monica Hutchings. “When I was growing up, my family moved to Kenya for around 10 years,“ Chris explained.

“When we returned in the late 70s my mother bought a grey Arab mare, this mare was my riding horse throughout the 80s and 90s.

“Then when the mare was aged 20, my mother put her in foal to the cremello American Saddlebred stallion Cloud Stepper owned by next door neighbour Henry Betts at Little Barningham. The resulting foal was Zawadi, the dam of Kamili. Zawadi means gift or present in Swahili.”

Zawadi’s eldest daughter, Takwenya is on the British team for the forthcoming World Endurance Championships in Slovakia next month. Takwenya and Chris were the top British endurance combination in the 2015 FEI world rankings.

The next foal bred from Zawadi, a mare named Peponi by Krayaan Dilmun took the 2015 British novice endurance championship with Chris who is hoping that she will go on to be a contender for WEG in 2018.

“I am 61 now and so I am hoping that Kamili will be my final endurance horse throughout my 70s and into my 80s,” said Chris.

Chris’ younger sister, Melanie Blake has moved back to Kenya and has set up a mental health charity over there which she called Kamili, and suggested this name for the colt.

The 2016 Futurity evaluations runs from August 15 to 31, covering 11 venues nationwide with a total of 12 days of evaluations.

Futurity scores are used by many breeders as a credible marketing tool for their young horses, adding value to a young horse whilst it is still too young to have achieved a performance record.

For more information, visit britishbreeding.org.