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Great Meadow

7/31/2017

I was so excited to be able to compete at our Nations Cup, especially on JR (Inmidair), a horse I thought would never compete at that level again. I was so truly honored to ride him, and was thrilled with my weekend. That little horse certainly hasn’t forgotten how to put his super suit on!

I felt prepared going in because I had a plan and I put it into action. JR’s dressage needed to be better so I really worked on that with Sallie. I needed to be able to practice jumping 1.30 meters, so I did that with Katie Prudent’s and Packy McGaughan’s help. I had to get better at cross-country, because as much as JR has a super suit and is really talented, he still needs to be better, more in front of my leg, and I really worked on that. I had had an earlier school with Boyd at his place and I almost fell off about four times, I couldn’t see a distance, I had no rhythm, and I kept taking the reins and slowing my horse. It can be hard to make yourself keep going and get in the mindset you need to compete at the upper levels! But I kept working on all these things, had a good school with Phillip, and felt prepared.

I thought JR was great in the dressage, but our show jumping lacked some polish. I was surprised how spooky he was, I wasn’t even sure he would go over the first jump! It took about three jumps to put him together, and even though I got a bit backwards to a vertical, we finished well with a clear round. JR’s really hard to show jump because he never jumps each jump the same. Sometimes it takes a little bit of me letting go, knowing it might not work out, and sometimes I’m good at it and sometimes not.

I walked the cross-country and was quite comfortable with course but but it was hard to wait to go second to last. I probably walked the arena corner five times, and talked over how it would ride with Lynn and Buck four or five times. But as I walked back to my trailer I told myself, he’s going to go in four, just be ready to think on your feet and react. If you mess up, you learn something, you can’t protect yourself all the time. Then I never looked back. The decision was made, I knew my job, I wasn’t nervous. I really thrive on this sport and I love trying to get better, and my horses make me better all the time. I can’t wait to do it again. The weekend wasn’t perfect but I improved my skills on JR from the last time I rode him at Kentucky. I realized how quickly our sport evolves, and if I’d gone faster I'd have had a chance to win. But I had ten time, and I was a bit upset about that. I’ll just try and be better the next time.

One Crazy Week!

7/24/2017

I got home from Germany Monday night, the week of our Surefire Horse Trials. I’m so lucky that Tom, Christy Stauffer, Caitlin Calder, Katie Hasse, Hellen LaFitte, Trav Schick and his wife, Kat, and brother, Graham, and Josh Sylce had a great jump on what needed to be done for the weekend. Our event went off great—we were so lucky to have the weather we had, plus we have the most amazing group of people that come and help us every year. It’s a huge chore and a huge team that makes everything work. Nanky Doubleday, Po Tatham, Mary Coldron, my parents Dick and Jo, Lisa Welch, Lisa’s step-mother Anne, Sarah and Michelle, all help so much it’s really impressive. I don’t know how Tom, myself and my parents got so fortunate to get all the amazing help we have. Everyone knows what they’re doing, everyone steps up. Thanks to Janet Galay for all the great photos!

I had a pretty crazy week following our horse trials. The Monday after, I got in the car at 4:30 in the morning to take JR up to cross-country school with Phillip at Windurra. I really felt like I needed to get my head around being competitive at Great Meadow, which was coming up quickly. Tuesday morning I headed to Sallie Spinard’s, my amazing dressage coach, for lessons. Wednesday, I caught a 5:00 AM flight to Colorado for a clinic and started teaching that morning. There’s no rest for the wicked and I got back Saturday afternoon just in time to do a little bit of last-minute prep for Great Meadow.

Luhmuhlen

7/22/2017

Since I last checked in after Virginia I’ve done a lot. The first thing I did was go to Luhmuhlen in Germany as a USEF Selector—I was so proud to be an American and all our riders were really great! Luhmuhlen is a beautiful event to visit and I would say was inspiring to watch and certainly made me hungry for competition and look forward to competing abroad again at that level.

I was the only U.S. selector there because we have to keep costs down and with six horses and five riders going, it was pretty easy for one person to cover. These days you can see so much online, the other selectors could watch that way, but it’s nice to have at least one person there, to get a good feel of the vibe of the event. I’m pretty new to the job, but when it comes right down to it I think every one of us wants to be competitive and wants the U.S. to win. The bottom line is, if you’re winning you’re going to be picked and if you’re not, you’re not picked. If you have the drive to go and put yourself on the line and end up in the top ten, you’re more likely to be picked. Riders and horses have to be competitive week in and week out. Getting the job done is really, really important. It’s really very simple. As a selector, I want all the riders to do great, I don’t want to not pick someone. I wish we had 20 people who could win every weekend!

Busy Month of June

6/6/2017

We just got back from a really successful weekend at the Virginia Horse Trials, where the weather and footing were amazing. It was Brynn Littlehale's first East Coast competition—she’s from California, where she was on the under-18 and under-25 lists, and is spending the year with us. We’re really excited to have her! Maddie and Katie Lichten also competed, as well as some other students and myself. It was a great weekend for everyone and the only one that was not super was Inmidair (JR), my ever-faithful companion, who thought it was so exciting to be back out competing! He was quite naughty in dressage, although his trot work was quite good, and show jumping. I think sometimes you get protective of their soundness when they’ve had injuries and forget to train them. Although JR is really fit, he hasn’t really jumped as much as I normally would. Sometimes it’s hard to know when you’ve done, or not done, enough. My conclusion at the end of the weekend was I hadn’t done enough, especially since I had to go out Saturday morning and gallop before I ran the 2-star cross-country just so he’d be rideable! Mark Phillip’s newly designed track, although two minutes uphill at the start, was a great. All that being said, JR was super fun cross-country.

I was also lucky to be able to ride RF Luminata and Kortina for owners Harold and Katie Lichten and the Lichten family. Both horses finished third in their divisions. I was really impressed with how much Kortina has grown up in the last year, and this was the first time I felt like she understood and enjoyed the cross-country. As far as Luminata, I had forgotten what an amazing cross-country horse he is, and just a pleasure to ride in all three phases. Hopefully, I’ll be able to help Katie better understand how to ride him after having him for a month of training.

Volcan was my other ride, and I think he finally turned into a Preliminary horse. So far my young horses have been jumping the Preliminary jumps, but haven’t really been ready to gallop for time and still understand what was being asked. Volcan really stepped up this weekend and was actually quite fast.

As far as my students go, Brynn was third on her Preliminary horse, Kilbunny Amigo, and won on her Training horse, Lagerfeld. Maddie Lichten—I’m so so proud of her— won the JYOP on Yarrow from the dressage on, with such a nice test and such a good weekend in every phase. Katie Lichten rode a young rescue horse, Piper, in its first event at Beginner Novice and completed, even though they had a 20 cross-country because poor Piper decided he wanted to go back to the barn. Katie also rode her mother’s horse, Womble, and finished 6th in the Novice division.

I was lucky enough to jump school Valerie Vizcarrondo’s horses when she was away in Poland working on her judge’s license. She was back home to compete them at Virginia and won the Preliminary Horse division on Favian and was 5th on her Novice horse, Dewey. The CCI* divisions were won by students Skyeler Voss and Claudia Sarnoff—I’m so proud of both girls! I’m especially proud of Skyeler because of all the ups and downs she’s had with her amazing Thoroughbred, Argyle.

Naughty JR, photo: Virginia Horse Trials

Skyeler and Argyle, photo: Tylir Penton

I took JR to a dressage show last weekend to practice some circles, and will hopefully show him at Upperville this week in preparation for a better result with him at Great Meadow. We’ve been busy prepping for our horse trials that are quickly approaching the 23-25 of June. Before that, I’m lucky enough to be able to compete my young horses at the Middleburg Horse Trials June 10-11, and then go and watch all the Americans at Luhmuhlen June 15-18 as a selector. Busy month!

Rolex

5/17/2017

The highlight for the month of April personally, was going to Rolex as selector and spectator—it’s always so educational. The quality of the dressage has gotten so much better and is more and more a pleasure to watch. I walked the cross-country course three times and thought it was really difficult. I had to laugh that riders were saying they thought it was more straightforward than in the past—I don’t know what a straightforward 4-star is! I think that Derek is a master at making things look jumpable, yet making a rider work the whole way around. 4 ABC—a hanging rail, three gallop strides to a downhill brush, then four strides to narrow brush corner--tested the riders’ confidence and ability to understand the question, balance, gallop and ride a line. From that point on you had to work all the way around the course. The highlight of the day had to be watching Phillip Dutton and Mr. Medicott—pure class! If I had to pick some other highlights they would be Zara Tindall, who made it look easy, and Matt Brown, who clearly meant business. Michael Jung lived on the edge but is the master of knowing his horse and his sport, and Maxime Livio had such a scopey, brave horse, they were a pleasure to watch.

I think the show jumping was a tough track I feel we all need to get better at not having time faults. It sure continued to a nail-biting finish to the end!

It’s the time of year that I get to live on the mower and balance riding with farm work as we prepare for our Surefire Horse Trials June 23-25. At the moment, I’m also slated to go to Germany to watch Luhmuhlen CCI**** June 15-18 as a selector, and I’m going to run my young horses at Virginia and Middleburg Horse Trials.

Developing Event Horses

5/16/2017

Electrik (Elvis)

Volcan de Caverie (Volcan)

Dashwood (Nora)

I’ve had quite an interesting last six weeks. Having young horses is always a challenge and people forget how long it takes to develop a horse to the level they’re capable. But, it’s always a great process and one that I enjoy.

So the babies—Elvis, Nora and Volcan—all moved up to Preliminary together and have had a couple runs at that level, some outings better than others. The highlight was last weekend at MCTA, not because any of them won the dressage, but because it was the most grown up all three of them have been.

To be honest, all three horses are able to jump the height of Preliminary, but are not completely ready to actually gallop and process everything at Preliminary speed. I have to educate them piece by piece and build on their knowledge. I think the most educational time for these horses and me is right now, because Preliminary teaches them the most and allows me to see if they’re going to be Intermediate or Advanced horses. They outgrew Training level but can’t quite apply all that they learned to Preliminary. I’m a huge believer in focusing on the horses’ fitness and jump education so that they really understand this level, and it can take two years. I think the new Training/Preliminary division is great idea for this reason, though I haven’t been to a lot of events that have offered it. At end of day, it takes so long to make up a good horse because you have to take the time for them to understand how to gallop, go forward and back, and balance the gallop, and that’s all hard to do. I can balance any one of them at 450 meters a minute, but not at 520.

And each horse is different. Nora is really changing in her body, and she’s a Thoroughbred, so it’s so much more natural for her to gallop cross-country and I’ve been faster on her by far. Show jumping, however, is harder, as it normally is for thoroughbreds. I call her my little Rocana (after Jung’s fischerRocanaFST) because she’s such a trier. And my beautiful Elvis is finally learning how to gallop, relax AND jump. Then there’s Volcan, who’s more mature than the other two in his body and his jump but still really has no idea how to gallop. He’s a year older than Nora and Elvis and has a little bit more of an idea how to process the sport, but is quite soft as far as his whole physique goes, which takes a while to develop. Nora and Elvis aren’t soft, but they need strength. Volcan is a soft athlete at this point; he’s physically quite strong but his muscles are soft.

A lot of times as a rider we get caught up in our success but my enjoyment is actually developing the young horse. You have to have a lot of patience so you can keep them confident and on your side, so that they learn to enjoy the sport. I think people sometimes forget how versatile event horses have to be, needing to learn how to go up and down and balance on terrain, and how to lengthen and shorten their stride. When you think about the training scale and rhythm and relaxation, and then we ask them to gallop at same time—that’s hard!

And on the flip side, I have my great friend Inmidair (JR) that I’m just enjoying day by day. My highlight for the month of April as a rider was running around events with him, and it just amazes me how lucky I am to have such a great horse. He made the Fair Hill cross-country seem easy. Right now, my plan is to do the CIC** at Virginia and the CIC*** at Great Meadows with him, but we’ll see.

JR at Fair Hill

On to Spring!

3/25/2017

I’m at Carolina International to coach the Lichtens and work as a High Performance Selector. I was entered to ride with JR—he was awesome at Pine Top—but decided not to bring him after he bruised a heel on his good leg. Even though I don’t always want to admit it to myself, there always is another competition. As I’ve said before, I’m just taking it day by day with JR and enjoying every minute I get to ride him. In spite of not riding myself, these weekends are always educational and help to improve my own riding and thought process.

All my horses have been fun and I’ve had some great lessons jumping with Phillip, who constantly works on improving my position and reaction time, whether cross-country or show jumping. I’ve also had some dressage lessons with Mara Dupuy, which was fun, and I was able to participate in the Tracie Robinson clinic at Stable View. Tracie coached the Brits for last 15 years and is now freelancing and helping William Fox-Pitt, Kitty King and a handful of others. I thoroughly enjoyed her approach, which was simple and straightforward and delivered with pretty good British humor. It was especially fun to ride JR and Vulcan with her because their improvement from the first to the second day was pretty remarkable. Sharon White and I are hoping we’ll have her for some clinics this spring.

I’m proud to say that my three Training horses—Vulcan, Electrik and Dashwood--are now Preliminary horses. All three continued to improve this winter and I’m pretty excited about them. I’ve decided to run all of them at Morven and will probably reroute JR there as well.

Our drive home from Aiken to Virginia was uneventful. It’s always nice to get home and Tom had made the barns and farm beautiful as always. The cherry blossoms are blooming this weekend, all the trees are budding and some flowers are out.

The Comeback Kid

3/3/2017

Inmidair at Pinetop in the Open Intermediate!

A Busy Couple of Weeks

2/17/2017

We have had amazing weather here in Aiken, with consistent rain so that the footing is ideal. And, with The Vista schooling facility being irrigated, we have great conditions for training. We’ve had a chance to run a few more horse trials with the babies and the girls’ horses. Stable View really does a great job, from the footing to the rings to the courses it’s top notch. Plus, Electrik (Elvis) even got some money for winning his Training division! All three of my horses did well—aside from Elvis winning, Vulcan and Dashwood (Nora) were good in the dressage and the jumping phases and both got a ribbon. In addition, Nora won the TIP High Point. I was completely thrilled that Francesca’s Broggini’s horse, Cooley High Flyer, won his Novice division. He’s a beautiful mover, quite a good jumper, and has grown up a bit, so his jumping, galloping and steering are much better.

Madlen (Lesesne) and Melissa (Lempicki) competed at Full Gallop in the Beginner Novice on the weekend before Stable View. Madlen was able to complete her first recognized show and get over all the jumps and Melissa came in second. I’ve been lucky to have Madlen, a student of Mimi Combs who’s here for her J-Term, helping me this winter, and also 15-year-old Alissa Recapito, who’s doing school and working for me as well. Alissa was second on Bonnie After Dark in ONB.

Aiken’s so great because I could compete at Stable View Tuesday and Wednesday and have all my students compete on the weekend at Sporting Days. I was back at Sporting Days February 5th and Alissa did Training, and other than having a little blond moment in dressage, she jumped great. Madlen was hugely improved from her first show, jumped all the jumps the first time and improved her dressage by 12 points. I’m so proud of her! The Lichten sisters did their first show of the year and Katie was first on Luminati and Maddie was second on Yarrow. Both rode quite well even though there was a little dressage confusion in terms of which test they learned. There’s always something, it’s how you handle it that counts!

I rode Francesca’s young horse, Cooley High Flyer, in the Training and he won from start to finish. I’m quite proud of him. I also had the pleasure of riding the Lichten’s young horse, Kortina, in the Beginner Novice and she won her first event. We have to celebrate while we can because these things don’t happen that often. Madlen was tenth in the division.

After having a full weekend, I went to a rated dressage show on Wednesday and did a first level test with my three training horses, Elvis, Volcan and Dashwood. Elvis won and the other two tied for second. It was my first show in almost three years with JR (Inmidair) and he was fourth in First Level test 1. He was quite excited!

I had a really good jump school with Phillip in preparation for Pine Top and on the weekend competed. The three Training horses were pretty good except for poor Elvis, who was going cross-country when the train was going through the back of farm. He was so nervous—it was a huge train! What’s the likelihood of that happening? There are things you just can’t control and you have to deal with them.

Francesca ran in the Preliminary with her horse, Petit Blue Marine, and had a good learning weekend as far as making sure she could stay in rhythm and practice the details. Eventing this time of year is like spring training for baseball! The Lichten girls were great and they continue to ride well and improve every time. Their horses have come out this year stronger than ever. Katie was second and Maddie fifth in quite a competitive JYOP division. The highlight of my winter so far is that I got to do Preliminary on my good friend, JR. He put in a really nice dressage test although was quite excited for show jumping. I just let him go around cross-country conservatively because he was so excited—it’s the first time he’s run since Kentucky three years ago. JR’s such a pleasure to ride and such a great cross-country horse, we couldn’t take the smiles off our faces!

As you can tell, it’s been an exciting three weeks in Aiken. We have a couple horses at Paradise this weekend and then Pine Top Advanced. I have no major plans for JR—every day I get to ride him is a bonus, and it’s nice to see him so happy, a good reminder of why we do this.

Settled in Aiken

1/26/2017

I hope everyone had a great New Year and holiday season, I did! Tom and I enjoyed being with my family and had a blast skiing for five days. I got home on January 2nd, packed up and drove down to Aiken on the 3rd to set up, and by the evening of the 4th, Surefire south was open for business. I’d like to give a huge shout-out to Adolfo and Alissa for all their packing, to Tom, his brother, Jimmy, and his friend, Carl, for loading 150 bales of hay in 20 minutes, and to MJ transport, who once again shipped all the horses beautifully. We have a great crew: Adolfo, who runs the whole barn; Alissa Ricapito, who’s here for the Aiken season with her horse; and Madlen Lesesen, who’s here for her J term from Randolph Macon and will stay until the 5th of February.

We got to Aiken and the weather was great at first but then we had three days of freezing cold. Coming from Virginia it wasn’t too bad; there were snowflakes in the sky but they didn’t touch the ground. Since I didn’t go to Wellington this year, I’d entered the event at Stable View, which is quite early, and I had to get ready to compete! In Aiken, we’re lucky because we have The Vista, where we can cross-country school, gallop, and do dressage or show jumping. The whole facility is irrigated and run really professionally, allowing our horses be up and ready to run.

I ran Volcan, Dashwood (Nora) and Francesca’s, Cooley High Flyer, at Stable View, Dashwood and Volcan in the Training and Cooley in the the Novice. All of them were quite good. Volcan ended second, and I think he’s almost ready for Preliminary. Other than a steering mishap on cross-country with Cooley, when I couldn’t turn, everything else was great.

Inmidair (JR) is galloping five miles and starting to jump and I’ve entered him at Pine Top in the Preliminary. Who knows what’s going to happen, I’m taking it day by day, but I’m certainly having a lot of fun riding him! Urrem (Rem) is feeling well and is enjoying the Aiken (mostly) sunshine. In my 14 years of coming down here it’s never been this warm or this nice. The girls and Francesca compete this weekend at Full Gallop, and my horses will do Stable View Tuesday and Wednesday.

It was great to see Phillip on the weekend and get some great help from him. We’re all thinking about Phillip, Evie, Leelee, Olivia, Mary and Richie, praying for them and hoping we can help them stay strong.

I’ve also had a couple lessons with Boyd and I really enjoyed his attention to detail. He reminded me about being precise in my position, and to make sure I ride all sides of the horse.

My goal this year is to concentrate on what I do well and not sweat the small stuff—I’ll let you know how it’s going!

Thinking of Leelee!