Equestrian 50p (2011)

Equestrian is one of the higher-mintage designs in the London 2012 set, so a circulated coin is easy to find and condition decides the price. Check the horse's legs, the rider and the fence bars: crisp detail with little rubbing is worth more than a flat, scuffed coin. Examples still in the Royal Mint's Equestrian coin card, or in the Equestrian coin cover, sell above coins from change, especially if the packaging is sealed.

With 2,142,500 struck for circulation, the Equestrian 50p is the 30th rarest of the 81 ranked 50p designs and has the 75th lowest mintage of all 194 circulating UK designs. That puts it in the Scarce band, for mintages 1,000,000 to 2,499,999.

The next rarer 50p is the Badminton 50p, with 2,133,500 struck, and the next more common is the Boxing 50p, with 2,148,500 struck.

Look for a horse and rider in the air over a fence with two bars. The horse's hooves and the lower bar sit just above 50 PENCE, so the jump takes up most of the coin below the London 2012 logo. On the heads side you will find the 2011 date and Ian Rank-Broadley's portrait of the Queen. No varieties of the Equestrian 50p are known.

Thomas Babbage was working in Austria when he heard about the Royal Mint's competition to design coins for the London 2012 Games. With plenty of free time on his hands he drew designs for several sports, and it was his equestrian entry that won. He researched by studying photographs of horses at riding events and the different ways they appear in competition, because he wanted the coin to look true to the sport, so that people who know a lot about riding would see something familiar. He admitted the Olympics had meant little to him when London won the Games, since he was not from the city and had never lived there, but winning a place in the series made the event personal and drew him into following it. The reverse shows a horse and rider in mid-jump over a fence with two bars, the horse's hooves and the lower bar sitting just above the words 50 PENCE. The Games emblem, with the five rings inside its 0, fills the top of the coin.

It was one of the 30 coins in the Olympic set issued in 2011.