Zara Phillips and Mike Tindall wedding: What we can expect
Talented: Zara is a fine sportswoman as well as a shrewd businesswoman
THE BRIDE
Zara Phillips MBE, 30, is 13th in line to the throne, the daughter of Princess Anne and Captain Mark Phillips and the Queens first grand-daughter.
A trained equine physiotherapist, Zara won gold at the World Equestrian Games in 2006 and has her eye on the Olympics in 2012.
She has seven horses in her yard and rides all of them every day. She has like those great paragons of the physical world, Ryan Giggs and Gazza won BBC Sports Personality of the Year.
She has also shown herself to have a head for business. Aside from her sponsorship deals, including Rolex, she designs her own line of sportswear for Musto, ZP 176. Zippy and fleecy, it looks more Vicky Pollard than Prada, but it is practical (though not cheap, at 320 for a jacket).
Educated at Scottish boarding school Gordonstoun (before going to Exeter University), Zara has retained a fondness for the country and is getting married in Edinburgh.
This is something she shares with her mother. Princess Anne is patron of the Scottish Rugby Union and married her second husband, Cdr Timothy Laurence, at Crathie Kirk near Balmoral.
THE MUMMYS BOY
Mike Tindall OBE, 33, is a Yorkshire lad, educated at a grammar school in Wakefield.
His parents Philip, 64, a retired bank official, and Linda, 63, a social worker are resolutely middle class.
Philip, who has since been diagnosed with Parkinsons disease, didnt enjoy retirement and he went back to work ! part-tim e in the finance department of Newhall Prison, near Wakefield.
Oh, to be a fly on the wall when Philip meets Philip and Linda meets Liz at the wedding reception.
Their son, Mike, once sold fish and chips from a van which he hated, describing it as just a lot of rowdy northerners complaining about the size of the fish and is now captain of the England rugby union team.
A man of many nicknames, most of which revolve around his size, he is known as the Fridge, the Lord and Tins. But dont judge him by his appearance off the pitch he describes himself as a mummys boy.
Given that his father and five uncles played rugby before him, it was natural young Mikes future lay on the pitch.
Smile: It's anticipated thir 'regal' wedding will be on a different scale to Prince William and Kate's
HIS CONK
When Mike was five, the seatbelt came loose on a dodgem car and he head-butted the steering wheel, breaking his nose.
Hes since broken it eight more times and doesnt want to do anything else to it, since the last repair job collapsed in the middle of a game and metal plates fell on the pitch.
His future mother-in-law who has a particularly imperious conk suggested a nose job before the wedding.
He refused, saying: Its now part of me.
THE ROMANCE
Prince Harry introduced Mike and Zara in a Sydney bar during the 2003 rugby World Cup. Zara was on her gap year.
Rather ungallantly, Mike revealed that Zara had insisted a friend passed her phone number to him, saying: She wants you to text her.
The following year she asked him to the North Cotswold Ball as mates. Still, it worked. Would you say no to Princess Annes daughter! ?
POPPING THE QUESTION
Zara's cousin William may have flown Kate to the slopes of Mount Kenya, but Wakefield Mike was a little more laidback. He came downstairs one Saturday night while Zara was glued to The X-Men on the telly. She was on the sofa, which helped, he told an interviewer.
Then he bent down, no easy feat for a man of his bulk, and popped the question. She laughed; luckily, she said yes.
No controversial Mummys ring is being recycled here: Mike had a brand new, though bespoke, diamond job waiting. There is no evidence of a matching tongue stud.
Cheers: Mike Tindall enjoyed an epic stag do in Florida
THE BOOZE-ATHON
An epic stag do in Florida, surely inspired by hit film The Hangover. Where Prince William pussy-footed around the West Country with a few toffs and a surfboard, Mike and his mates managed to make Miami Vice look like Jane Austen.
Attacking the bars of trendy South Beach on a three-day bender, they took in 1,500 units of alcohol between 12 of them, at a cost of 12,000.
There were play fights, telephone numbers swapped with girls in bikinis, and a waitresss tutu on the groom. You have to wonder what the Queen made of the resulting photos...
GOING GAGA
Zara turned her hen night into a three-day Portuguese henathon, sporting a tutu of her own. Where Kates hen night was so discreet we werent sure shed had one, this was a full-on foreign trip with ladette friends, including
Sky Sports presenters Kirsty Gallacher and Di Dougherty, Prince Harrys ex Natalie Pinkham, and Kenny Dalglishs daughter Lynsey, all playing rowdy drinking games.
Zara wore a pink cuddly toy cow round her neck and a Lady Gaga-style wig. They stayed at Campo Real Golf Resort and Spa, a 200-acre gate! d develo pment being built by a friend of her fathers, Eduardo Netto de Almeida.
Zara is having a four-bedroom, four-bathroom house, Villa Caiscais, built there for 590,000.
THE PICCIES
Mario Testinos shots of William and Kate in one of the magnificent gilded rooms at Buckingham Palace ended up on the cover of Vanity Fair. Zara and Mike stood outside their house in the snow, wearing jeans and layers of fleece.
But for Country Life for whom her parents had posed, at Buckingham Palace, back in 1973 she posed in front of a pile of logs and substituted her trusty black labrador, Storm, for Mike. But dont be deceived by the spontaneity of the shot Mustos name was visible on the fleece and her sponsors donated Rolex was cannily displayed on her wrist. Pity they couldnt squeeze a Land Rover another firm she promotes into the frame.
THE FROCK
First the rumour factory said it was by the Queens favourite designer, Stewart Parvin. While Parvin has personally told me its not him, after Sarah Burton denied designing Kate Middletons dress, who knows?
Also in the running is Paul Costelloe (although it is more likely he is making her going-away outfit. He made a fetching silver number for Zara for William and Kates).
It could well be by trendy designer label Marchesa, which Zara has in the past said she likes.
The Palace vetoed Zara's plans to have the wedding covered in Hello! magazine
GOODBYE HELLO!
Zara is said to be extremely annoyed that the Palace has vetoed her plan to flog her wedding to Hello! magazine.
Her grandmother, the Queen, was said to be appalled when big brother Peter sold pictures of his own nuptials. Rumour has it Zara has had to turn down 1million.
But! perhaps she should be pleased.
After she did an at home shoot with her ex, jockey Richard Johnson, for 125,000 a few years ago, they split up following a brawl to which police were called. So she might avoid the Hello! curse...
HIS KIT
Mike is wearing a custom-made suit (you try buying off the peg if youre built like him) from Cad and the Dandy in Savile Row. His team, sorry ushers, are going there, too. You have to have sympathy for tailor James Sleater, of Cad and the Dandy, clothing all those sixteen-stoners with their huge biceps.
As he pointed out mournfully, when youre dressing rugby players, cloth consumption goes up and profits dwindle.
He added that Zara wore the trousers during the fitting and had expressed views.
THE BASH
The palace of Holyroodhouse is the Queens official residence in Scotland. The most high-profile royal weddings here were those of Mary Queen of Scots to her second husband Lord Darnley.
It was not the happiest of unions; jealous of his pregnant wifes secretary, Darnley had him murdered in front of her. Darnley, believed to be syphilitic and by then loathed by all, was then murdered himself.
Mary married again at Holyroodhouse, to a man called Bothwell it lasted a month and he ended up in a lunatic asylum. She ended up being executed, messily by two bloody strikes, by her cousin Elizabeth I.
Still, if anyone can make such a bloody setting jolly, itll be Bentley
Entertainments Peregrine Armstrong-Jones, half-brother of Lord Snowdon and party-planner to the WAG set. Dont let the royal-sounding surname make you think he cant do flashy Carole Middleton crossed him out as too ostentatious.
Perry did Full-length and Fabulous for the Beckham wedding; arranged David Furnish and Elton Johns civil ceremony; and organised the Blenheim Palace union of Chelsea and England captain John Terry to WAG Toni Poole.
The Queen's parish church: Zara and Mike will be wed at Canongate Kirk on Edinburgh's Royal Mile
So anything could happen ... although it is unlikely that Mikes uncle, aunt and cousins, who have a folk band called The Tindalls and sing Fleetwood Mac covers, will be asked to perform.
Zara is also said to be planning a tea party for local pensioners and an event for local schoolchildren anyone between 18 and 65 can make their own fun, presumably.
Lothian and Borders police, with good Scottish pessimism, have announced that there will be minimal opportunity for getting a good look and have asked people to stay away, although the council will have to shell out 400,000 for extra security anyway.
They have also told furious local shopkeepers that they have to shut up shop for two days. Thats the spirit!
No invite: Prince Harry's new squeeze Florence Brudenell-Bruce may not get an invite to the party
THE BESTIE
Vying with Prince Harry for title of most sought-after bachelor is the witty best man and former team-mate of the groom, Iain Balshaw Balsh.
Balsh plays for Biarritz rugby club and is also available for modelling shoots.
Hell fulfil the Pippa role of being much ogled as he walks down the aisle, particularly as his nose is still in one piece.
THE REVELLERS
A boisterous mix of sports people, royal relations and Yorkshires finest. From the royal side, expect the Queen and Prince Philip, the Duke and Duchess of Cambridge and, excitingly, Prince Harry, probably on his own! , unless his new model squeeze, Florence Brudenell-Bruce, bags an invite, although probably not, as Zara apparently sees herself as a matchmaker and may have her own ideas about who to pair Harry with.
Princess Anne will be with Cdr Laurence, and Zaras father Captain Mark Phillips with his second wife, American equestrienne Sandy Pflueger. He has two other daughters Felicity, 26, by former mistress Heather Tonkin, and Stephanie, 13, with Sandy. Felicity has never met Zara and has not been invited to the wedding.
Mikes family is a little more straightforward although being large, you cant squash that many of them into a pew.
THE CHURCH
Canongate Kirk in Edinburgh is the Queens parish church when she is in Edinburgh. Rev Neil Gardener bumped another couple a lifeguard and a graphic designer to fit in Mike and Zara, but is said to be receiving a substantial donation for his flexibility.
Economist Adam Smith and Robbie Burnss mistress are buried here. Separately.
WHAT, NO HONEYMOON?
There isnt one at least not straight after the wedding. Zara will be galloping off to the Gatcombe Horse Trials while Mike returns to training. No sweat.
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