The model:
Meally Greenwood, photographed by Graham Flack.
Our cover model this month is Meally Greenwood, the fiancée of top jockey Robert ‘Choc’ Thornton. The couple met in Choc’s local pub in Gloucestershire when Meally – a Yorkshire lass – was visiting a friend who had relocated to the area. They soon became buddies and the friendship blossomed over a year until one day Choc travelled up north to invite Meally on a date.
“I wasn’t really involved in racing,” says Meally, “My mum really enjoys it and goes to Cheltenham every year, and my grandfather also loved racing but although I knew Choc was a jockey, that was about it.”Since then Choc has gone on to win the Cheltenham Champion Hurdle aboard Katchit last year, and evidence of his numerous other victories fill the open-plan sitting/dining room of their beautiful new house: trophies, enormous bottles of Champagne, framed photographs, and in pride of place on the coffee table, a pair of cufflinks engraved to mark his first 100 winners, presented as a surprise gift by Meally.
Meally is rightly proud of her man, but she is no stranger to internationally competitive riding herself – after school she followed an eventing career, working at the yard of top British rider Karen Dixon.
This came to a natural end, however, when Meally left to travel the world and she spent a year in New Zealand before eventually returning to the UK. Arriving home, she took up work as a nanny: “I have always enjoyed working with kids – I have a sister, Sarah, who is six years younger than me, so I guess it comes naturally,” she says. Sarah (21) is also a keen rider and horse owner, but older sister Charlie (28) has not got the bug.
Both sisters will be bridesmaids in Meally and Choc’s wedding next summer – a day that Meally did not always believe would happen. “We used to talk about it a bit but Choc was so not going to get married,” she recalls, then looks at the diamond ring glinting on her finger and grins. “Obviously he changed his mind!”
Four years after their first date, Choc once again travelled to Yorkshire to meet Meally’s parents – and ask permission to request her hand in marriage. Permission granted he next fooled Meally into believing he had travelled to Swindon for a concussion test (an annual routine test for jockeys) when in fact he had gone to London to buy the engagement ring.
Mission accomplished he returned home to pop upstairs for a hot bath while Meally made a cup of tea. It was only when he reappeared dressed in a smart shirt – rather than the usual after-work casuals – that Meally began to suspect something was up.
“I was thinking, what’s going on?” she says, eyes alight at the memory of that moment, “Then he came over to me in the kitchen and proposed!
“He got the box out with the ring, and had the Champagne in the fridge ready and everything… I cried a little bit and then spent the rest of the night on the phone to everyone – it was so exciting!”
Amidst the excitement there was still room for pragmatism. Before a wedding could be arranged, there was a house to sort out – their new pad was designed and constructed in time for them to move in last Christmas and the Big Day was set for next summer – which will be two years after the proposal – to give them time to settle in, along with Puppy Princess their lovely black Labrador dog (who has her own little photo gallery on the wall next to her bed!).
In the meantime, Meally continues with her full-time job as a nanny and Choc keeps riding – and winning – races, travelling to the yard of trainer Alan King twice a week during Jump season. With his lucky charm at his side for life, surely a great future beckons for all.
“We go to The Plough pub or just love being here because we’ve not been here that long – we’ve been to so many weddings this summer so it’s nice to have time at home, we’re both quite home people.”
Knowing each other’s habits:
“Choc says you can always tell who went to bed last because of what is on the TV the next time you turn it on – if it was him it will be the sports channel and if it is me it will be a chat show!”
“I used to go shopping every week but we’d end up throwing it all out, so we just go to the pub now.”
“I didn’t eat lots of biscuits anyway so it’s not an issue. It depends what race he has got on – he can’t eat the day before, and will sit in the bath and have a sweat; he does that once or twice a week. Sometimes I go to the curry house while he’s upstairs starving in the bath!”
“His favourite food is chocolate. I don’t really like it but he goes through stages liking one thing then another – its Snickers at the moment. When he left home his mum always made him eat veg etc so he thought cool he could eat all the chocolate he wants so he would go out with his mates for dinner and they would order a proper meal and he would have chocolate – it was nearly all he ate!”
The outfit:
Meally wears: Crea Concept dress £227 and shrug £108; Oska Almea armlings £35; Monark neclace £51; Urban Code bag £159; Sandwich footless opaque leggings £11; Audley Modelo ‘Syme’ boots £225.
To download a copy of the October Pocket Guide click here.
