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The dairy farmer making history at Harrogate's Great Yorkshire Show
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“I can’t describe that feeling on the first morning, when it all comes together,” says Rachel Coates, the new show director of the Great Yorkshire Show. “I’d love to bottle it because it’s so special.”
That first morning feeling will become apparent tomorrow (July 8), when the first of 120,000 visitors over four days pass through the gates of the Great Yorkshire Showground in Harrogate.
The sell-out event, which is being staged for the 166th time, draws heavily on tradition. But Ms Coates, who succeeds Charles Mills, represents a break from the past in one key sense — she is the first female show director.
Her credentials are impeccable: a regular show-goer for more than 40 years, her family has a dairy farm on the edge of Baildon Moor in West Yorkshire and has been showing cattle at the event for about 15 years, winning Holstein champion in 2022 and 2023, and she is a council member of the Yorkshire Agricultural Society, the farming charity that stages the show.
Ms Coates, who has worked in advertising, retail and education as well as agriculture, is also a director of a community interest company which runs her local farmer’s market.
A keen gym goer, who discovered weight-training after breaking her arm and trying to rebuild strength, she is particularly pleased to see this year’s drive to promote fitness and wellbeing in the agricultural sector.
Farmers can visit a field nurse trailer for a free health check and talks will take place around mental and physical health.
The show also hosts its first ever Britain’s Fittest Farmer contest, a kind of strongman and strongwoman event with a rural spin. Pulling a truck, dragging a seed bag and sandbag squats are among the events. The winners will qualify for the final at Jeremy Clarkson’s farm in Oxfordshire.
Mr Coates says:
The hour I spend in the gym clears my head. The old guys used to say that if you have time to go to the gym, you are not working hard enough. But there is much greater recognition of the mental and physical challenges now.
Rachel Coates
Being show director entails lots of shaking hands and greeting people, especially VIPs. The biggest VIP — King Charles III — last attended in 2021 when he was still a prince and although no royal visitors are expected this year, whoever next accepts the invite will be greeted by Ms Coates on the red carpet.
She admits to some pre-show butterflies but being well acquainted with the show means she knows the pitfalls and what can be done to avoid them. She has particular empathy for exhibitors:
Because I have been one, I know what it’s like to basically live in this part of Harrogate for a week. I know that camping and caravanning can be a challenge, depending on the weather.
With temperatures expected to soar into the high 20s, this week's forecast could hardly be better. What advice does she have for visitors? “Just make sure you experience the show properly. There is a gem around every corner.”
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