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Imagine you have hundreds of event entries spread out on a table in front of you and you have to organize them, assigning each rider ride times that won’t ruffle their feathers, making sure the day’s schedule will run smoothly, and stabling everyone in stall locations that prevent awkward social encounters back at the barns.Then, one rider with six horses entered calls and says she has to be finished riding by 3 p.m. Another one
e-mails the day before the event, asking if he can switch divisions. Sound like fun?
Event secretary Mary Coldren said, “Bring it on!”
The unofficial queen of ride-time scheduling, she’s the cheerful wizard behind the curtain at many East Coast events, making sure each rider has a workable time schedule and the day goes smoothly.
“I think what Mary brings to the table that has made her so sought-after is her constant calm,” said event organizer Johanna Hall Glass. “She deals with emergencies and conflicts in a completely professional way.”
Coldren goes out of her way to make sure riders are happy with their entries, and since she’s been a fixture at so many events, she’s familiar with most of the names and personalities behind the entry forms.
Except for on one memorable occasion.
“I had an entry for a starter horse trials that was on the wait-list for the beginner novice division,” Coldren recalled. “The rider called and said that if there was an opening in the novice division, he would take it. Thank goodness I phrased my question, ‘Are you sure the horse is ready for it?’ Because it turns out that the rider was [Olympic gold medalist] Leslie Law! At that point, he’d just moved here, and he was a new name for me on entry forms!”
Part of Coldren’s mastery of ride-time scheduling is her familiarity with the riders.
“You get to know who can do what. I can schedule Sally Cousins on eight horses at a one-day event while someone else can handle only three horses. I know Sally can do a dressage test every 20 minutes and be fine. If I did that to someone with just two horses and no help, it wouldn’t work,” she said.
“To me, it’s like a puzzle. Scheduling makes a lot of people crazy, but I’ve heard from riders that if they know I’m going to schedule an event, they’ll enter more horses because they know I’ll make it work. Multiple rides are what make it a challenge. I can schedule an event—figure out which divisions go in which rings, how many are in each division, and the overall schedule—in two or three hours. Then, I’ll spend another 10 hours moving all the people with multiple rides around until I get it to work.”
Coldren has gotten so good at scheduling that she offers it as a service to events even if she’s not their secretary.
Coldren lives in Cochranville, Pa., but spends five months in the winter based in Aiken, S.C. “In order to earn a living in this career, you have to travel,” she said.
In addition, she’s a U.S. Equestrian Federation licensed technical delegate. Coldren’s jobs keep her on the road most weekends of the year.
