{"id":626164,"date":"2026-06-07T15:22:12","date_gmt":"2026-06-07T15:22:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/626164\/"},"modified":"2026-06-07T15:22:12","modified_gmt":"2026-06-07T15:22:12","slug":"captain-mark-phillips-makes-a-rare-appearance-with-his-ex-wife-princess-anne","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/626164\/","title":{"rendered":"Captain Mark Phillips Makes a Rare Appearance With His Ex-Wife Princess Anne"},"content":{"rendered":"

\"Estimated2 min read<\/p>\n

Since Captain Mark Phillips<\/a> and Princess Anne split in 1989 and divorced in 1992, the equestrian coach has kept a relatively low profile. Phillips, 77, is most frequently pictured at horse events and supporting his daughter, Zara Tindall, in her equestrian career.<\/p>\n

\"BadmintonDavid Davies – PA Images\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Zara Tindall with her father, Captain Mark Phillips, on day two of the Badminton Horse Trials 2024.<\/p>\n

However this weekend, the former British Army officer made a rare appearance with his former extended family at his son Peter Phillips\u2019s wedding to Harriet Sperling<\/a>.<\/p>\n

\"PeterMax Mumby\/Indigo\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Mark departing the ceremony.<\/p>\n

\"PeterKarwai Tang\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Anne after the wedding.<\/p>\n

After he and Anne divorced, Mark remarried to Sandy Pflueger, a fellow equestrian, and they had one daughter, Stephanie<\/a>. Mark and Sandy later divorced in 2012. He is now reportedly dating Florence Standaert, a 44-year-old Belgian equestrian. Standaert was pictured with him at the wedding yesterday<\/p>\n

\"CelebritySpotlight Royal\/Bauer-Griffin\/\/Getty Images<\/p>\n

Florence Standaert and Captain Mark Phillips at Burghley Horse Trials, September 2024.<\/p>\n

Mark recently retired from his role designing equestrian courses, he revealed last year. \u201cI\u2019m retiring from designing,\u201d he said<\/a>. \u201cThough I\u2019ll stick around to offer my services as an advisor to anyone else who is designing a course.\u201d<\/p>\n

Phillips shared his philosophy on designing courses: \u201cI focus on six key elements: I make sure there\u2019s a beginning, middle and an end to the course, that it flows well, and that no matter what the level of difficulty it always offers options for the less experienced combos.\u201d He continued, \u201cThen I think about creating some slower sections\u2014not at the expense of the course\u2019s flow, but designed to make the time factor more significant. I also like to create questions so that the riders really have to ride, not just \u2018point and kick\u2019.\u201d<\/p>\n

He added, \u201cI always try to make my courses as kind as possible to the horses, while keeping them challenging for the riders.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Headshot<\/p>\n

Emily Burack (she\/her) is the Deputy Digital Editor for Town & Country, where she covers entertainment, celebrities, the royals, and a wide range of other topics. Before joining T&C, she was the deputy managing editor at Hey Alma, a Jewish culture site. Follow her @emburack on Instagram, Twitter, and other social media platforms.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"2 min read Since Captain Mark Phillips and Princess Anne split in 1989 and divorced in 1992, the…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":626165,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[32],"tags":[6491,178878,379,212295,381,96,190731,380,159164,212294,178877,56,54,55],"class_list":["post-626164","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-celebrities","tag-celebrities","tag-collection-royal-family-news","tag-content-type-news","tag-contentid-ea249aa0-ed29-4285-b349-e52004ef904e","tag-displaytype-standard-article","tag-entertainment","tag-issyndicated-false","tag-locale-us","tag-read_time-2","tag-shorttitle-captain-mark-phillips-makes-a-rare-appearance","tag-subsection-heritage","tag-uk","tag-united-kingdom","tag-unitedkingdom"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626164","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=626164"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/626164\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/626165"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=626164"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=626164"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=626164"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}