Maggie McAlary’s first-round course in the Pessoa/USEF Hunter Seat Medal Finals didn’t go quite as she’d planned.

“In the first round, my horse was a little bit nervous. This is his first year doing the equitation. He got a little tense going to 4AB, and he had A down, but he got much better as the round went on,” McAlary said.

The judges, Bill Moroney and Jimmy Torano, put McAlary fifth after all 271 riders had completed Round 1, and then they moved her up to second after Round 2. And McAlary made the final move to the top in the final test, where the top eight riders switched horses, to take the win, Oct. 15 at the Pennsylvania National Junior Weekend in Harrisburg, Pa.

“I thought she got better and better as the day went on,” said Moroney. “In the first round, she was very good and solid. The second round was even better.

“And when we switched the two horses, we thought that Sloane [Coles] and Maggie both had horses that were a little tough to ride, and we thought she did a great job on Sloane’s horse,” added Moroney.

“This division was made for someone like Maggie,” said Andre Dignelli, who trains McAlary, 16, in conjunction with Patricia Griffith and Kirsten Coe. “She’s a strong rider; she rides in a half-seat, and she has a beautiful style. I thought Maggie rode great this morning, and the horse went only OK. I thought the second course kind of suited us–there was a place we could slip inside and be a little bit fancy. The horse is particularly careful for an equitation horse, so we don’t worry about turning back on jumps.”

McAlary burst upon the show scene in 2000, when she was 10. She earned the small pony championship and the best child rider on a pony honors at that year’s Devon Horse Show (Pa.), and went on to win the AHSA Pony Medal that same year. McAlary, Amherst, N.H., and her mother work to develop and sell hunter ponies, and she’s moved from the ponies to junior hunters, jumpers and the equitation division with similar success.

“It was her turn to win. She’s been knocking at it for a number of years,” Dignelli said.

McAlary has earned a string of second-placed finishes this year–she took individual silver at the CN North American Junior and Young Riders Championships (Va.), second at the USEF Show Jumping Talent Search Finals-East (N.J.) and individual silver again at the Adequan/USEF Prix des States Individual Junior Jumper Championships at the Pennsyl-vania National the night before.


Shuffling The Standings
Julie Welles, who last year won the USEF Show Jumping Talent Search Finals-East and the Tad Coffin WIHS Equitation Classic Finals (D.C.), claimed second place behind McAlary. She rode 7-year-old Sander in just his fourth outing in the equitation.

“I felt very confident going in on him. The only thing I didn’t like about my first round was the first line. But after that I relaxed and he relaxed, and it was a lot smoother,” Welles said.

“I couldn’t have asked him to go any better in the second round. And then, I got to swap onto a horse I got to show a little this summer, [Zazou Hoffman’s horse] Littlefoot. I felt confident going in, and I rode him like I usually did, with a loose pace, and it all worked out. I couldn’t ask for myself or my horse to have gone any better today.”

The judges had called Welles back in fourth after the first round, and her fluid second-round course kept her in fourth, but then her test on Hoffman’s horse bumped her up to second. Welles, West Simsbury, Conn., and Hoffman both ride with Missy Clark and John Brennan. They’re working students for Clark and show sales horses in the equitation divisions.

Hoffman, 14, Santa Monica, Calif., stood sixth after Round 1 and moved up to fourth before the horse switch. She rode Welles’ horse, and she wasn’t as forward as she could have been. The tentative ride dropped her to fifth at the end of the day.

In the biggest leap of the day, Adrienne Dixon, of Hillsborough, Calif., ended up in third. She’d been 12th in the first callback and moved up to eighth after a lovely second round. And after she rode Molly Braswell’s horse to perfection in the test, she jumped five more places.

“My first round was good. I was just happy to be in the top. I knew that in the second round I’d really have to ride well to get into the top group. And then I was in shock that I made the last test,” Dixon said.

This was Dixon’s second trip to the Finals. “Last year, I leased a horse, and it was not good. I stopped, and it was awful,” she said.

This year she again leased a horse–Tarantino. Fellow Californian Alex Maida was leasing the gray gelding from trainer Don Stewart Jr. and offered Dixon the ride as she had another horse to show. Dixon’s primary trainer, Carrie Atkinson, suffered a broken wrist and didn’t travel to Pennsylvania, so Dixon looked to Benson Carroll and Stewart for help over the weekend.

She’d only ridden Tarantino for a week but felt confident. “I had watched Alex ride Tarantino a lot, and I’ve never seen him do anything bad, so I was fortunate. She told me everything about him. He was super–I never had to hesitate about anything. He has a giant stride,” she said.

Maida herself finished sixth in the class.

Coles moved up from third in the first callback to first going into the final test with two smooth rounds. But her ride on McAlary’s horse didn’t go quite as well. The horse, Mid-Accord, hesitated off the ground jumping into a combination, and then Coles got a bit deep to an oxer. The judges dropped her to fourth.

It was McAlary’s ride on Coles’ horse that clinched her win. “I’ve seen Sloane show that horse a lot, and I watched her in both rounds today, so I got to take what I saw and try to simulate it. He has a very big stride–much bigger than my horse’s–so I had to keep a feel of his mouth, where on my horse I can just ride forward,” McAlary said.

Kacey McCann had been on top of the list after the first round, but an inconsistent trip in Round 2 dropped her to ninth place. Maida stood second after Round 1, but she jumped in weakly into a long one-stride oxer-oxer combination in Round 2 and had the rail at the B element. She was called back in sixth for the horse switch, and a nice ride on Eleanor Kunsman’s horse kept her there.


Asking The Questions
The judges were particularly impressed when the riders switched horses, since they negotiated the Round 2 course again. “The second course really demanded that you knew where your horse was all the time, and that you followed a specific track, especially from 2 to 3AB,” said Moroney.

“If you shaved in from 2 and got to 3A weak, you had a long way to get out over the B element. You really had to know your horse, and that’s what I thought was interesting in the ride-off, because the girls pretty much figured out each other’s horses in two jumps and some flatwork. They knew what their weaknesses and strengths were.”

Moroney and Torano designed the first-round course in consultation with Conrad Homfeld. Their course started asking questions right away.

Riders had to complete their opening circle in the small confines behind a dotted line, which was challenging because the first fence was a triple bar, headed directly away from the in-gate. A forward pace was vital, since the ideal ride led in a flowing five strides to an oxer, and then another tight three strides to a vertical.

“In the first round, we really did want to see them hunt right up the first line–get a gallop going to the triple bar and jump right up the first line. Preferably in the five [strides], but the six [strides] was there. Some people did it in six nicely, but more people did it in the five [strides] nicely. I think it asked for shortening and lengthening and control of your horse’s stride,” Moroney said.

In the second course, Moroney and Torano created a track that demanded accurate lines and turns, and again they stressed the importance of adjusting the horse’s stride. The last line–an oxer followed by five quiet bending strides to another oxer, and then four forward strides to a tight two-stride combination–was a particular challenge.

For more coverage of the Medal Finals, including a comprehensive blog of all the action, go to www.chronofhorse.com, and click on the online coverage archives.


Molly Sorge