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Ocala Comes to an End

3/24/2022

I can’t believe that my Christmas and winter in Florida have all kind of melted into one. I’ve had a great time in Florida but left for home yesterday and leave for a clinic in Colorado today. We had had three girls—Sara Schulman, Casey Little and Ella MacMaster—helping who were with me all winter and were a great group to work with. They were super organized, rode really well, and were just fun to be around! So thank you to them.

Casey helping with Kaylin's horses Urrem, Unbridled Numbers and Volcan

Urrem in a lesson at Will Coleman's

Kaylin Dines had some great placings in the high adult jumpers with her horses Unbridled Numbers, Urrem and Volcan. My own Storm has gotten better and better, thank you so much to Mike Huber, Lynn Symansky and Baron Heilbron for helping me with him. My newest Thoroughbred, Collection Box, has done his first couple cross-country schools and dressage lessons and is even better than I’d hoped!

The weather and the ability to train, lesson, school and compete in Ocala makes the winter really productive here. I'd like to give a huge shout-out to Mike and Cherye Huber for hosting my horses again this year. They’re so great to deal with and great friends. And of course thanks to Marnick Farm and Susan and Barton Merle-Smith—I'm so lucky to have them as friends and stay with them.

Barton and Tom in their fish taco outfits!

I'm super excited for what the rest of year has to bring and I can’t wait to go to Land Rover Kentucky, Badminton and Luhmuhlen. I'm also looking forward to having more adventures with Kaylin and her horses and my own horses. But mostly, it's so great to see Tom and the dogs. I'll try not to wait so long to post again!

Ellie Mae!

End of the Season

12/13/2021

I can’t believe it’s December! I tried something new this year as far as my end-of-year competitions go, and finished Storm at Mid-South in Lexington, Kentucky in the 2-star long. It was a great competition, my only wish is that they had used the proper rings instead of the old in-field for the dressage. Everything else about the competition was great, though. Even with that being said, the dressage was still good footing, just not the Kentucky rings. I was so pleased with Storm in all three phases, and he gave me one of his best tests, and was clear and in time on cross-country, making it feel easy. Although I had rail down behind going into the triple in show jumping, it was one of the most ridable rounds I’ve had. I was disappointed because it dropped him in the placing, but I wasn’t disappointed in him, he’s so fun.

I had the pleasure of going to the new 5-star at Maryland as a Selector and was so impressed! If you didn’t see it, I recommend you go next year. I was shocked how different the property looked and what a good job they did in all aspects. In my mind, Maryland could rival Badminton or Burghley. The courses were amazing! The only thing I wish had been offered was more food choices on-grounds to accommodate the amount of people who attended, but that’s a great problem to have and easy to fix. Being near a college town, there were lots of options for dinner and hotels, so that was nice.

I also went to Tryon as a Selector, and I would say having gone to Morven for the 4-star long and short, and Tryon for the 4-star long and short, you couldn’t actually compare the courses because you would be comparing apples and oranges. I thought Morven was amazing and the education it gave the horses with the use of the terrain and the design, was like a 4.5-star compared to Tryon’s 3.5-star. Atmosphere is important at these big events, but if the only atmosphere you have is in dressage as it was at Tryon, it almost feels unfair.

It’s interesting in my mind that we’re getting ready to select for next year’s WEG and we’re selecting from two completely different competitions—how do you do that? I can see horses and riders going well at Morven and then going on to Kentucky. Mark Phillips is always so creative, but I felt Tryon was much less technical than it was the year before, making it harder to see that path to a 5-star. Derek did Morven and it was amazing, though I hope they can step up their atmosphere to match the courses. If you want to know if you have a 5-star horse, go to Morven, it’s an education in course design and fitness and will only make your horse better if that’s what you’re aiming for.

I’m all ready to spend Christmas with my family like I do every year, and I can’t wait. I got myself an early present and her name is Invito (above), who I own with my parents. I call her Vida in the barn. She is the sweetest, most lovable horse to be around and I enjoy riding her every day. She’s a good mover and jumper, and thank you Buck Davidson for selling her to me. I can’t wait to have fun with her and am so excited for myself and my parents. After the holidays I’ll go to Ocala for a couple months. Hopefully everyone has a happy holiday season, and I’ll see you in the new year!

Fall Competitions

10/8/2021

It’s been a little bit since I blogged last, and it’s hard for me to believe we’re right into fall now. I did get to go on a nice vacation to Mexico in August with my whole family. It was super fun to see my nephews and nieces, and to spend time with my Mom and Dad. Unfortunately, Tom and Rich couldn’t come because of work, so that was a big bummer.

Storm has been super fun and he’s really starting to get a little more mature in his thinking, and though he still lacks some strength, it’s all going in the right direction. Because I was gone to Mexico I decided to run him at Waredaca the weekend before Great Meadow. It was actually quite a good course for Storm because it had a nice flow with some good exercises that in my mind set him up perfectly for the next weekend.

I was super pleased with Storm at his first 2-star. Great Meadow is always impressive because the rings have a good atmosphere plus beautiful footing. He had a nice dressage test, he just broke from the canter because of lack of strength (and a little bit because of his laid-back attitude), so our score suffered a bit. We had really nice show jump and he was super all the way around. Of course cross-country day was incredibly humid, but Storm handled that like a champ to just have two time penalties. I though the second water, with the log into it, was quite a big effort to the corner out, and again, Storm handled it really well, showing me how much he’s matured.

Old Tavern Horse Trials at Great Meadow

I did a day at the local jumper show and Kaitlyn’s two and Storm were all double clean—it was super practice! Volcan and Kaitlyn were fourth in the speed and third in the classic. Next I ran the Preliminary at Old Tavern at Great Meadow and again, Storm had beautiful trot work, nice halts, but was maybe a little green in the canter still though working in the right direction. He was double-clean in show jumping and had just two time to finish second. This weekend we’re at the CCI-2 short for six-year-olds at Morven so wish me luck!

We have a lot of fun things coming up this month: I get to attend the 5-star at Maryland as a selector and then my plan is to do the 2-star long at Kentucky at the Horse Park with Storm. I finish the month teaching a clinic at Platinum Farms for Rochelle Constanza. I love going there because she and her husband, Nick, have done a great job with their cross-country course, and the bonus is I get to see my parents!

Summer

7/23/2021

I’ve been super busy this summer with the horses. I went backwards a little bit with Storm after talking with Phillip, just to fill in some of the holes in his training, and decided to compete three weekends in a row—Louden Training, Loch Moy Modified (and snuck to a jumper show on Wednesday), then back up to Preliminary at Loch Moy 2. It was actually a super easy progression and thank goodness the footing wasn’t as hard as it is now because I would have had to modify my plans if that were the case. It’s amazing how quickly Storm got some good experience and how mature he finished cross-country at Loch Moy. Thank you Janet Gallay for the photos below.

Being able to do the jumpers at HITS and other venues has been a lot of fun and a great experience for all the horses. I find it extremely helpful for them to get in the ring again and again for several days of progressive jumping and not just single rounds as we have in Eventing. I’m so proud of student Kaylin Dines and her Urrem, who won the Classic at HITS Culpepper, and Volcan, who was second with Kaylin. She has really found her stride with both horses and it’s been so much fun to help her and watch her progress. As a bonus, I still get to ride her horses a bit.

I’ve been lucky enough to have Ella MacMaster, who is from Woodstock, Vermont, join us for the summer. She was with Clayton during all the restricted Covid months, and she’ll be heading back to finish school this fall and then hopefully go on to vet school. She has a young Thoroughbred that has been super fun to help her with, plus, if you haven’t noticed, Inmidair (JR) has been competing with Ella, which makes all of us smile. That tells you how special I think Ella is, because as we all know, JR is my heart horse.

Earlier this week, I taught in Vermont for a couple days and visited with my friends, Susan and Barton Merle-Smith at their High Wind Farm. Then, I headed to the Green Mountain Horse Association (GMHA) to help teach at the Area 1 Young Rider Camp. Until next time!

I love Horse Pilot clothing, for nice weather...and not so nice!

Training and Showing

6/3/2021

This is a bit of a delayed update, time gets away from all of us! Some things have been great since my last blog—I’ve made a lot of progress with Layla, who has now won three Novices. Storm and I had some good success to start and then some back-to-the-drawing-board training to make him more rideable. He’s super brave but also super careful, plus a little cheeky, and when I get it all back together he’s going to be a super competitive horse. The basics have to be good, and sometimes they can feel like they are but Storm was lacking a good response to my leg, so I’ve been working on that.

Sometimes, I think we get too familiar with our horses that we ride every day and it’s easy to be satisfied with good enough instead of really good. I feel it takes ten years to train a horse, and you always have to be refining your aids. I know all this, and decided to leave Storm with Phillip for boot camp while I’m away teaching a clinic. It’s always easier to ride someone else’s horse and always good to keep your training in perspective. As it was, Storm would have just been lunged at home, so I thought it was a good opportunity for Phillip to see where he is on a daily basis, rather than just having a snapshot into my training during a lesson.

Steely (Unbridled Numbers) did his first Intermediate at Morven Park but ran out of the smallest jump on course. I could tell from the jump before that something was not quite right. When I represented he jumped the first element but ran out at the second, so I retired on course. It turns out he had quite a splint that was really bugging him. He’ll have time off while that quiets down, and then will be back out at the end of June when he’s legged up. I’m looking forward to continuing Steely’s education at Intermediate, he’s such a nice horse.

I was fortunate enough to go to Kentucky, we were fortunate to have Kentucky! It was probably the hardest course I’ve ever seen there. I was hoping an American would win it, but as everyone knows, Ollie won for third time in a row. I think it was a fair course for the most part, and I found it super interesting to watch. One of the people I was really impressed with was Jonelle Price, who rode three horses and adjusted her ride to each to get the job done. She was so focused on the details as she went, and pushed herself to have every step go the way she wanted it to go. Not that other horses and riders didn’t do that, but it was very impressive she could do it on all three of her horses.

I felt bad for Phillip, who had some miscommunication with the starter and never got his watch started with Z. But Phillip had one of the best rounds I’ve seen him have in spite of that. I was super impressed with some of the American riders who really had great rounds, and think we have some beautiful horses for the future-Off the Record, Mama’s Magic Way, QC Diamantaire—were all impressive and so fun to see, especially with the WEG coming up next year.

Other than horses, my life has been filled with mostly mowing in my free time. With the beginning of June here, we’ll be back to some eventing and also the jumpers at Upperville and Louden Benefit—I can’t wait!

Layla finds it tiring to win all her events!

Horse Pilot breeches are great for running and riding!

Beautiful Storm at Hunt Club Farms Horse Trials. Thanks to Janet Gallay for the fantastic photos!

Tremaine Cooper

3/16/2021

I think I’m still in shock that I won’t see Tremaine Cooper again. As I walked across the field here at Surefire this morning, I was crying and smiling at the same time, remembering all the time he spent here working on our cross-country courses.

I first met Tremaine at Chesterland Farm when he was riding with Bruce. I also met his future wife, Marion, who was working for Bruce as his secretary, doing everything that job entailed. Tremaine was my friend, my student, the Surefire Horse Trial’s course designer, and someone to share laughs and argue with. In my mind, Tremaine also changed the sport of Eventing in Area 2 in a lot of ways as the mastermind behind the course at Morven Park.

One of my best memories of Tremaine is from last January. I needed to empty my manure cart at the barn and I couldn’t get ahold of Tom to help me. Anyone who knows Tom and me and our tractor, well, there’s some issues with me driving it… I can’t find the key, and if I do, I can't drive it because I normally can’t open door, and in the rare circumstance I can, I might sneak on it to move a jump or something, but it’s definitely Tom’s tractor. This particular day, I couldn’t finish the barn without emptying the manure, so I called Tremaine. He came over and kindly walked me through how to start the tractor, what the A, B, and C gears are, how to work the bucket, throttle the engine, how to go forward, how to back up and so on. Because of Tremaine I was successful and I was able to park the tractor, unhook it, and surprise Tom. As soon as I was done unhooking, my phone was ringing and it was Tremaine, just making sure I’d survived my mission and reminding me to turn the key off and take it out of the ignition. He was the best kind of friend.

I will be forever grateful for all the jumps and all the courses he designed for Surefire, all the people he’s introduced to Tom and me and our families, and all the fun we were able to share. My heart breaks for Marion, James, and Sadie, and his dogs, horses and chickens, and everyone else whose life was touched by Tremaine.

Jinshallah

3/12/2021

I have sad news from Surefire. I had to put down my Mom and Dad and my Jinshallah, who we called Gino, last week. He had always had a funny bump on his flank, and when I asked a vet a year ago what they thought it was, and they told me they thought it was his sternum, and I never thought twice about it. When my regular vet, Dr. Susan Johns, was in Florida in late February, I asked her what she thought it was, and she said if I wanted to know I should have it ultrasounded. I made an appointment with Dr. Carol Clark at Peterson and Smith. Come to find out from the ultrasound and now the necropsy, Gino had a tumor in his abdomen that was almost three feet long, two-and-a-half feet wide, and two feet deep. The biopsy results showed the tumor was cancerous. It was not attached to his intestines at all, so therefore he never had any digestive symptoms, but in hindsight, he was often grumpy about his right side. It’s amazing that he could jump and perform and never say no with that inside him. The last four days you could see where his belly had started to expand out and he was quite uncomfortable and spent a lot of time laying down. I felt like the only choice I had was to put him down.

Gino was one of the most amazing athletes—a great mover and he could jump a house. Of course he was brave as a lion and as clever as a cat, he was the whole package.

Ocala Continued

3/12/2021

This winter, Kaylin Dines has leased my horses Urrem and Volcan de Caverie for four months to do the jumpers. She came to Ocala to show for two week at the World Equestrian Center and did a great job, placing 5th and 8th in her first Classic, and winning a class on Urrem and placing 3rd in the same class with Volcan. It’s been super fun watching both the horses and Kaylin perfecting their skills. She will be back this week for two weeks of showing at HITS.

This last weekend I did Steely in the Preliminary one-day at Rocking Horse and he was great in the dressage, had a rail down behind out of the combination in the show jumping, and was super cross-country to finish 6th. Hopefully he’ll get sold before I leave Florida, he’s such a nice horse! Storm did the Training and was great in the dressage (although I thought they were hard on his score), beautiful in the show jumping and fun and fast on cross-country. He’ll move up to Modified at Ocala 2. Layla, who I just purchased with my Mom and Dad from Marilyn Payne, did her second Novice. She doesn’t quite understand what her job is yet, but she’s getting the hang of it. She is and will be a super nice horse. Marylin came down to ride her horse, Double Entendre, in her first event this winter and had a super nice dressage, one down in the show jumping, and just a little time cross-country. She’s all prepared for Carolina International on her way home. It was really nice to have her two horses with me this winter and to spend some time with Marilyn and her friend Mary Bancroft.

We don’t have a lot of time left in Florida but the girls and I have really enjoyed being at Mike and Cherye Huber’s Gold Chip Stables, which we have dubbed Goldfire Stables. I’ve been super lucky to have Kelsey Smith, who started with me last July, helping me all winter. Kelsey’s from Michigan and came to Surefire after a stint in the Peace Corp. Unfortunately for me, she’d always planned to leave at the beginning of April, so will be saying good-bye once we return to Virginia. She’s been an amazing help—super organized, has a great eye for detail, and she does everything with a smile on her face. I’m lucky, though, to have Jessie Biggs helping as well. Jessie came south with me to learn a little bit more about eventing and I’ve decided to hire her and am super excited to have her join the Surefire team.

Kelsey and Jessie

Ocala

2/15/2021

Happy New Year a couple months late! It seems like its been the longest year ever and I'm not sure we stopped 2020 before we moved on to 2021...

In the horse world we’re actually super lucky because we’re outside and still have the ability to ride and train horses and teach people every day. I've come down to Ocala again this winter because I really enjoy the area and the fact that there’s so much to do with every type of horse, and the weather is great. Last year, I decided not to compete while in Florida, I just wanted to train. This year I decided to do a bit of both. I was lucky enough to go to Wellington for two weeks in January to help Abigail McArdle flat some of her jumpers. Abby rides for Henri and Katie Prudent and Plain Bay Farm, and they allowed me to bring some of my horses so I could show on Wednesday and Thursday both weeks. It’s always great to be able to go to Wellington to just practice the finer points of show jumping. It was super fun, and I was so proud of Abby and Boogie Woogie for winning the Grand Prix on Friday in Venice Beach—I felt like I might have played a small part.

I came back to Mike Huber’s farm Ocala, where I keep my horses, and he was kind enough to help me school cross-country and show jumping, and put a little pressure on me for my upcoming horse trials. The first horse trials I went to I was asked to catch ride Double Entendre (Pun) for Marylin Payne. Marilyn had decided to keep her two horses with me this year, to do something other than going to Aiken. The horses arrived on January 20th and I was able to help her cross-country school her horse twice and watch her on the flat, and also get some help with my horses before she left to go home. Unfortunately, she couldn’t make it back to Ocala for her events, so I got the ride on Pun at Three Lakes in the Training, which was quite fun. I had a video taken of me practicing my dressage test before the competition and sent it to Marylin for input. She gave me five things to do to improve, and I succeeded in improving all five things during my test at the competition, hence why I got such a good score. I’ve never practiced my dressage test and then sent it to a judge—it was super helpful and I highly recommend it! I had one down behind in the show jumping on Pun but the horse was super fun and we finished second.

Our second event was the Ocala Horse Trials and I just have to say that with all the rain we got, I thought they did a great job managing the riders, ground and competition for everyone. I don’t think it was easy! Luckily we’re in Florida and the cross-country course held all the water and the footing was great. (Though maybe not the dressage ring, which was under water!) All my horses were good and although I didn’t win anything, they all got better and it was nice to see how much stronger both Beautiful Storm (Storm) and Unbridled Numbers (Steely) have gotten. My two Novice horses were babies but they certainly grew up around the course. It’s nice when your baby horses finish better than they started.

End of Recognized Surefire Horse Trials

11/26/2020

After much deliberation, I have decided that Surefire has run its final sanctioned horse trials. This has been a really hard decision, but the time has come. I’m super glad, though, that we decided to run this past June, even as the pandemic was creating new challenges to putting on our event. I feel grateful that we ended on a really good note.

I want to say thank you to every single rider, volunteer, official, supplier, sponsor, and course builder who over the years helped, supported and created our amazing event. There would have been no Surefire Horse Trials without Tom Finnen, Dick and Jo Byyny, and Christy Stauffer, and the list of others who were critical to our success is quite long. I appreciate everyone who pitched in, year after year, as part of our Surefire family. It is the memories of all who helped that stand out most for me.

Don’t worry, I will still be training horses and riders as well as teaching clinics and doing anything and everything I can to make our sport better. This is the end of the Surefire Horse Trials but not the end of Surefire! We’ll be open for schooling for anyone that wants to come by, just contact me to make an appointment. We’re working on plans to run derby crosses, schooling horse trials and some other fun shows. I look forward to welcoming you back to Surefire Farm.

With gratitude,

Jan