PrintForget that imposing fence—juggling work, riding and family can be the biggest challenge of all.
It’s a tough reality for most amateur riders that there really and truly are just 24 hours in a day, because it never seems like enough time.
Making decisions about how to use those precious 1,440 minutes the most efficiently is a constant battle. How do you squeeze in work, family life and the horses? It’s all about prioritizing. Everyone does it, but they all do it differently.
Every amateur rider has many roles to fill—full-time worker, horse caretaker, rider, mother, wife—they’re all important jobs, and it’s virtually impossible to fit them all into 24 hours. The key for each person is deciding what’s most important at her particular stage of life.
Maybe you don’t have kids, and riding and competing are a main priority for you. Then having a home-cooked meal on the table every night at 6 p.m. probably won’t happen, since you’ll be riding or in the barn until dark. But if you have a family, your horses might have to take a backseat to your kids, and boarding out and competing on a less-frequent basis will have to suffice.
So juggling all of these responsibilities, while still devoting enough time to a career to pay the mortgage and pay entry fees, takes a lot of dedication and creativity.
Here’s how four amateurs manage to do it.
They Attack Each Day Together
Kelly Soldavin: managing editor of Clinician’s Brief, a veterinary medicine journal.
Aaron Soldavin: police officer.
Kelly and Aaron Soldavin are married amateurs who have evented but now compete in combined driving.
“The driving fits better with our schedules because we’re both so involved with our full-time jobs,” Kelly said.
They take turns exercising their driving pony, Dutch. Kelly rides him and Aaron drives him.
“If we had two event horses going, the amount of riding involved to keep them fit and ready to go would be much more intense,” Kelly said. “Combined driving, with two people, is all about teamwork. You do have to cooperate and communicate. It’s helped our relationship, and it’s a great way to spend time together on the weekend. We don’t spend much time together during the week, but if we’re out on a conditioning drive for an hour, it’s an hour that you get to be together and talk and catch up.”
The Soldavins keep three horses and two donkeys at their farm in Quakertown, Pa.
“Depending on our work schedules, we have to make sure someone’s there in the morning to feed, turn out and do stalls and back in the evening to feed again. We also try to keep Dutch on a regular work schedule. We plan it out the week in advance. It requires a little bit of coordination, because Aaron works all different shifts, from 7 a.m. to 3 p.m. and from 3 p.m. to 11 p.m. or from 11 p.m. to 7 a.m. It’s never the same; we kind of make it up as we go,” Kelly explained.
Kelly noted that the winter season is their biggest challenge and where prioritizing becomes most critical.
“Horses are our social life; most of our friends are in the horse world, so we’re not going out to parties on Friday nights or throwing dinner parties. I can’t remember the last time we went to a movie theater,” she added with a laugh.
For the Soldavins, the horses take first priority so they’ve chosen to invest the time and effort into caring for them at home, as well as maintaining a competitive schedule.
