Zara Phillips
Encyclopedia
Zara Anne Elizabeth Phillips, MBE
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...

 (born 15 May 1981) is the second child and only daughter of Princess Anne
Anne, Princess Royal
Princess Anne, Princess Royal , is the only daughter of Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh...

 and her first husband Captain Mark Phillips
Mark Phillips
-Ancestry:-Issue:-Sources:...

 and is 13th in the line of succession
Line of succession to the British Throne
The line of succession to the British throne is the ordered sequence of those people eligible to succeed to the throne of the United Kingdom and the other 15 Commonwealth realms. By the terms of the Act of Settlement 1701, the succession is limited to the descendants of the Electress Sophia of...

 to the throne. She is married to England
England national rugby union team
The England national rugby union team represents England in rugby union. They compete in the annual Six Nations Championship with France, Ireland, Scotland, Italy, and Wales. They have won this championship on 26 occasions, 12 times winning the Grand Slam, making them the most successful team in...

 rugby union
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...

 player Mike Tindall
Mike Tindall
Michael James Tindall, MBE is an English rugby player who plays outside centre for Gloucester Rugby and has captained the England team...

, but has elected to keep her maiden name for professional and sponsors, referring to herself otherwise as "Mrs Tindall".

An equestrienne
Equestrianism
Equestrianism more often known as riding, horseback riding or horse riding refers to the skill of riding, driving, or vaulting with horses...

, Phillips won the Eventing World Championship
Eventing World Championship
The Eventing World Championship, or the eventing competition in the World Equestrian Games , began in 1966. It includes both a team and individual competition for the best horses and riders in the sport of eventing...

 in Aachen in 2006. The same year she was voted 2006 BBC Sports Personality of the Year
BBC Sports Personality of the Year
The BBC Sports Personality of the Year is an awards ceremony that takes place annually in December. Devised by Paul Fox in 1954, it originally consisted of one titular award. Several new awards have been introduced, and , eight awards are presented. The oldest of these are the Team of the Year and...

 by the British viewing public (an award her mother won in 1971). She was appointed Member of the Order of the British Empire
Order of the British Empire
The Most Excellent Order of the British Empire is an order of chivalry established on 4 June 1917 by George V of the United Kingdom. The Order comprises five classes in civil and military divisions...

 (MBE) in the 2007 New Year's Honours List by her grandmother for her services to equestrianism.

Family life

She is the eldest granddaughter of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh
Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh is the husband of Elizabeth II. He is the United Kingdom's longest-serving consort and the oldest serving spouse of a reigning British monarch....

. At the time of her birth she was sixth in line to succeed her grandmother, the Queen. As of the birth of her niece Savannah Phillips in 2010, she is 13th in the line of succession
Line of succession to the British Throne
The line of succession to the British throne is the ordered sequence of those people eligible to succeed to the throne of the United Kingdom and the other 15 Commonwealth realms. By the terms of the Act of Settlement 1701, the succession is limited to the descendants of the Electress Sophia of...

 to the thrones of 16 independent countries
Commonwealth Realm
A Commonwealth realm is a sovereign state within the Commonwealth of Nations that has Elizabeth II as its monarch and head of state. The sixteen current realms have a combined land area of 18.8 million km² , and a population of 134 million, of which all, except about two million, live in the six...

.

She has an older brother, Peter Phillips
Peter Phillips
Peter Phillips is the son of Anne, Princess Royal of the United Kingdom.Peter Phillips or Philips may also refer to:* Peter Philips Peter Phillips (born 1977) is the son of Anne, Princess Royal of the United Kingdom.Peter Phillips or Philips may also refer to:* Peter Philips Peter Phillips (born...

, born 15 November 1977, and two half-sister
Sibling
Siblings are people who share at least one parent. A male sibling is called a brother; and a female sibling is called a sister. In most societies throughout the world, siblings usually grow up together and spend a good deal of their childhood socializing with one another...

s, Felicity Tonkin, born in 1985 to her father by his brief affair with Heather Tonkin, and Stephanie Phillips, born 2 October 1997 from her father's second marriage to Sandy Pflueger
Sandy Pflueger
Sandy Pflueger is an American equestrienne. She has competed successfully in both eventing and dressage, finishing second at the prestigious Badminton Horse Trials in 1981 and competing on the United States Dressage Team at the 1984 Los Angeles Olympics.On 1 February 1997, Sandy Pflueger married...

.

At the request of their mother, the children of the Princess Royal do not hold any royal or noble title, nor are they automatically entitled to royal status by right of birth, as they are the grandchildren of a monarch in the female line.

During her schooldays, latterly at Gordonstoun
Gordonstoun
Gordonstoun School is a co-educational independent school for boarding and day pupils in Moray in North East Scotland. Named after the estate originally owned by Sir Robert Gordon in the 1600s, the school now uses this estate as its campus...

, she excelled at many sporting activities. She represented her schools in hockey, athletics and gymnastics. She later qualified as a physiotherapist specialising in Equine Physiotherapy, from the University of Exeter
University of Exeter
The University of Exeter is a public university in South West England. It belongs to the 1994 Group, an association of 19 of the United Kingdom's smaller research-intensive universities....

.

On 21 December 2010, Buckingham Palace announced her engagement to rugby union
Rugby union
Rugby union, often simply referred to as rugby, is a full contact team sport which originated in England in the early 19th century. One of the two codes of rugby football, it is based on running with the ball in hand...

 player Mike Tindall
Mike Tindall
Michael James Tindall, MBE is an English rugby player who plays outside centre for Gloucester Rugby and has captained the England team...

, who plays for Premiership side Gloucester and the England national team
England national rugby union team
The England national rugby union team represents England in rugby union. They compete in the annual Six Nations Championship with France, Ireland, Scotland, Italy, and Wales. They have won this championship on 26 occasions, 12 times winning the Grand Slam, making them the most successful team in...

. She lives with Tindall at their home in Gloucestershire. The couple met during England's Rugby World Cup-winning campaign in Australia in 2003, being introduced by Zara's cousin, Prince Harry
Prince Harry of Wales
Prince Henry of Wales , commonly known as Prince Harry, is the younger son of Charles, Prince of Wales and the late Diana, Princess of Wales, and fourth grandchild of Queen Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh...

. The wedding was held on 30 July 2011 at the Canongate Kirk in Edinburgh, Scotland. It has been reported that on account of her professional interests in equestrianism, she will continue to use her maiden name.

Equestrian

Following in both her parents' footsteps, Phillips is an accomplished equestrienne. In June 2003, she announced that she had secured a sponsorship deal with Cantor Index, a leading company in spread betting
Spread betting
Spread betting is any of various types of wagering on the outcome of an event, where the pay-off is based on the accuracy of the wager, rather than a simple "win or lose" outcome, such as fixed-odds betting or parimutuel betting. A spread is a range of outcomes and the bet is whether the outcome...

, to help cover the costs of her equestrian career.

Together with her horse Toytown
Toytown (horse)
Toytown, a chestnut gelding born in 1992, standing at 17hh and with particularly distinctive markings including a white blaze and white spots, is a British event horse owned and ridden by Zara Phillips...

, she collected individual and team gold medals at the 2005 European Eventing Championship
European Eventing Championship
The European Eventing Championship, like most other European Championships, is held every two years. Today it is a three star eventing competition....

 in Blenheim and individual gold and team silver medals at the 2006 FEI World Equestrian Games
2006 FEI World Equestrian Games
The 2006 FEI World Equestrian Games were held in Aachen, Germany from August 20 to September 3, 2006. They were the 5th edition of the games which are held every four years and run by the FEI. It was held in the Soers, a district of Aachen...

 in Aachen
Aachen
Aachen has historically been a spa town in North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany. Aachen was a favoured residence of Charlemagne, and the place of coronation of the Kings of Germany. Geographically, Aachen is the westernmost town of Germany, located along its borders with Belgium and the Netherlands, ...

, Germany, making her the reigning Eventing World Champion
Eventing World Championship
The Eventing World Championship, or the eventing competition in the World Equestrian Games , began in 1966. It includes both a team and individual competition for the best horses and riders in the sport of eventing...

.

Despite winning team gold at the 2007 European Eventing Championships in Italy, she failed to defend her own individual title after a problem in the show jumping phase of the competition.

It was announced by the British Olympic Association
British Olympic Association
The British Olympic Association is the national Olympic committee for Great Britain and Northern Ireland. It was formed in 1905 in the House of Commons, and at that time consisted of seven national governing body members from the following sports: fencing, life-saving, cycling, skating, rowing,...

 that Phillips would be riding Toytown as one of five riders for the British equestrian team at the Beijing Olympic Games 2008 in Hong Kong. However, an injury sustained by Toytown during training led to her being forced to withdraw from the team. Zara previously missed the 2004 Summer Olympics
2004 Summer Olympics
The 2004 Summer Olympic Games, officially known as the Games of the XXVIII Olympiad, was a premier international multi-sport event held in Athens, Greece from August 13 to August 29, 2004 with the motto Welcome Home. 10,625 athletes competed, some 600 more than expected, accompanied by 5,501 team...

 in Athens, when Toytown suffered a similar injury during training.

On 25 October 2008, she fell from her horse, Tsunami II, at the 15th fence of a cross-country event at Pau, France, and broke her right collarbone. The horse had broken its neck after it had tipped over the hedge and so had to be put down
Animal euthanasia
Animal euthanasia is the act of putting to death painlessly or allowing to die, as by withholding extreme medical measures, an animal suffering from an incurable, especially a painful, disease or condition. Euthanasia methods are designed to cause minimal pain and distress...

.

Royal engagements

As the eldest granddaughter of Queen Elizabeth II, Phillips supports many charitable causes. In 2003, she and Princess Anne
Anne, Princess Royal
Princess Anne, Princess Royal , is the only daughter of Elizabeth II and Prince Philip, Duke of Edinburgh...

 took part in the first UK double ship-naming ceremony in Southampton. Princess Anne named the P&O Cruises
P&O Cruises
P&O Cruises is a British-American owned cruise line based at Carnival House in Southampton, England, and operated by Carnival UK. Originally a constituent of the Peninsular & Oriental Steam Navigation Company, P&O Cruises is the oldest cruise line in the world, having operated the world's first...

 liner Oceana, and Phillips named its sister ship Adonia.

She frequently attends various events for charity and has taken to supporting certain causes herself, mainly for spinal injuries, equestrian charities and children's causes. In 2005, she auctioned one of her evening gowns (worn at the London premiere of the film Seabiscuit
Seabiscuit (film)
Seabiscuit is a 2003 American biographical film based on the best-selling non-fiction book Seabiscuit: An American Legend by Laura Hillenbrand...

) to raise money for tsunami
Tsunami
A tsunami is a series of water waves caused by the displacement of a large volume of a body of water, typically an ocean or a large lake...

 relief. She also undertook a visit to New Zealand in her role as patron of The Catwalk Trust. From 1998 to 2005 she served as the president of Club 16-24, a group which encourages young people to take an interest in racing. She is linked to INSPIRE, the Salisbury based medical research charity which helps to improve the quality of life of people with spinal cord injuries, and Sargent Cancer Care for Children, the UK's leading children's cancer charity.

She appears at events for The Caudwell Charitable Trust, which is targeted at children with special needs, disabilities and serious illnesses. She has continued her family's long patronage of Great Ormond Street Hospital for Children and has visited on many occasions. In 2006, she took part in a special charity day for Cantor Index, whose staff were killed in the 11 September 2001 attacks. In 2007, she became patron of the Mark Davies Injured Riders Fund. To help with Sport Relief 2008
Sport Relief
Sport Relief is a biennial charity event from Comic Relief, in association with BBC Sport, which brings together the worlds of sport and entertainment to raise money to help vulnerable people in both the UK and the world's poorest countries...

, she posed for her first official royal portrait by artist Jack Vettriano
Jack Vettriano
Jack Vettriano OBE born Jack Hoggan , is a Scottish painter.- Early life :Jack Vettriano grew up in the industrial seaside town of Methil, Fife. He left school at 16 and later became an apprentice mining engineer. Vettriano did not take up painting as a hobby until the 1970s, when a girlfriend...

. In 2009, she attended a celebrity poker tournament in Monaco
Monaco
Monaco , officially the Principality of Monaco , is a sovereign city state on the French Riviera. It is bordered on three sides by its neighbour, France, and its centre is about from Italy. Its area is with a population of 35,986 as of 2011 and is the most densely populated country in the...

 in aid of Darfur
Darfur
Darfur is a region in western Sudan. An independent sultanate for several hundred years, it was incorporated into Sudan by Anglo-Egyptian forces in 1916. The region is divided into three federal states: West Darfur, South Darfur, and North Darfur...

, Sudan. In September 2010, she attended the 2012 London Olympic Ball alongside cousin Prince Harry of Wales. In October of the same year she attended another celebrity poker tournament, this time in London, in aid of Cancer Research UK, of which she is Royal Patron.

Clothing design

In 2009 it was announced that Phillips would be designing her own range of equestrian clothing for Musto Outdoor Clothing
Musto (company)
Musto is a clothing brand based in England. The brand was established in 1965 by Keith Musto, a British Olympic sailor and engineer. Musto sells sailing clothes, equestrian clothing, shooting apparel and lifestyle outdoor clothing ....

. The range is named ZP176 after the team number Zara was given when she first represented her country. The range was officially launched in July 2010.

Ancestry



External links

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