Granting the Fellowship is the highest accolade the Society can bestow on a trainer as it represents the pinnacle of equestrian professional qualifications. There are just 53 BHS Fellows and of these only Christopher Bartle is an Honorary appointment, all the others having taken an examination.

Ferdi, who is 49 years old and based in Worcestershire, spent his early life in Germany, serving an apprenticeship with Olympic Gold medallist Dr Reiner Klimke before coming to England in 1980. Eleven years later Ferdi took out British citizenship and has achieved major successes as a top-level dressage competitor in this country including representing Great Britain at two European Championships, in 1993 and 1995, and at the World Equestrian Games in 1994.

In 2002 Ferdi was appointed as the British Equestrian Federation's World Class Performance Director of Coaching and is now the BEF Acting World Class Performance Manager and Director of Coaching. In January this year he led a two-day clinic for BHS Scotland at Gleneagles Equestrian Centre, an event that proved very popular and successful.