Whether she’s backstage in Europe sending Susan Dutta and her Grand Prix horses into the ring, or on the sidelines at Timmy Dutta’s polo games in Wellington, Florida, Carly Muma has become an indispensable part of the Dutta family’s life for the past 13 years.
“I know there’s a lot of really dedicated grooms out there that are amazing, and she belongs right up there,” said Susan. “She’s just one of those extremely dedicated to her job. She loves these horses and has a huge threshold of responsibility to make sure that no stone is unturned. … She’s an incredibly dedicated young woman, and a huge, huge asset to me and my program. I already told her, ‘If you quit, I quit! All the horses are for sale.’ I’ve said that to her many times. ‘I’m not doing this without you.’ ”
Muma, 35, grew up in Michigan with a mother who loved horses and taught her good horsemanship skills. She did 4-H and hunter/jumpers then switched to eventing, but she never had grand showing ambitions. She applied for a job at eventer Buck Davidson’s farm in 2010 and stayed for about two years helping run his 70-horse operation.
Working for Davidson fueled her love of high-performance sport, and she groomed top horses like Ballynoe Castle RM, Copper Beach, Park Trader, Absolute Liberty and The Apprentice.
“My constant work ethic and the will to just keep going and doing whatever the horses need until the bitter end of the day comes from eventing,” she said. “They are some of the hardest-working people I have ever been around, and they do it—I mean, everybody does it—for the love of the horse. If you’re not in this for the love of the horse, then you shouldn’t be in it. But the eventers are cut from no other cloth I’ve ever seen before.”
Muma’s also proud of her Midwestern heritage and considers it to be a core part of her identity as a groom.
“Quite a few of my friends from Michigan are also very good grooms and show managers. I swear, it’s just something about people from the Midwest that just bust their [butt] and work hard,” she said. “I don’t know if it’s just the way we were raised or what, but I think eventing definitely taught me that you work, and there’s like, a hundred million things to do, but you’re doing it, and you’re doing it with a smile on your face. We always had fun; we always were laughing and having a party in the stable.”
When Ballynoe Castle RM was shortlisted for the 2012 London Olympics, Muma met Tim Dutta, founder and owner of The Dutta Corp., which flies horses around the world, during quarantine in Gladstone, New Jersey.
Tim offered her a job if she ever got tired of grooming, and she took him up on it later that year for a chance to try something new. She worked in his New York office, helping coordinate flights, doing paperwork, and being on the ground at the airport to help with horses. She spent a season in Florida doing importing and exporting, including meeting horses like Daniel Deusser’s FEI World Cup Final champion Cornet d’Amour and Kent Farrington’s Gazelle when the mare was first imported.
“You get to meet all these incredible horses that, at the end of the day, they don’t know that they’re that incredible,” she said. “They’re just horses, you know. But it’s just so cool, the different animals you get to meet doing this job.”
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But office life wasn’t for her for long, and less than a year later, she took a job as Susan’s full-time groom. She’d filled in for her groom a few times during that season, and while she initially thought a dressage job would be boring compared to working with eventers, she and Susan soon developed a strong working relationship, and she fell in love with Susan’s horses. She also started helping the Duttas’ son Timmy, now 23, as he got into polo.
“Honestly from there, [Susan and I] kind of clicked together, and I love Timmy,” she said. “He’s like my brother, and we just had so much fun in the stable together. And I think that’s a super important part of a team and a dynamic—having fun.
“Honestly, I don’t care what sport it is—when you take care of these animals, it’s just a privilege every day,” she continued. “At the end of the day, good horse care is good horse care; it doesn’t matter if it’s a polo pony, a dressage horse, a jumping horse.”
Susan, a former eventer herself, appreciated that connection with Muma. Watching Muma interact with Timmy as he grew up also was special from a mother’s perspective.
“This is a family operation, and she’s dedicated to my son and his polo ponies, and that’s difficult because it’s in the middle of our season too,” Susan said. Muma sometimes uses her day off from dressage grooming to work on the polo ponies and do therapies for them. “She’s like, I want him to succeed, and I know I can help them,” Susan said.
One of Muma’s favorite parts of the job is watching the many young horses Susan brings along, like Figeac DC, who Susan got as a 4-year-old and is now 16 and competing at Grand Prix.
“He’s everybody’s favorite, because he’s just gorgeous,” Muma said. “I mean, he’s on the Purina mash bag! He’s a supermodel. He’s in all the photos with Anna Buffini for LeMieux right now. I think he’ll always be super special to me, just because he has this heart that he would give everything to Susie in the ring.”
While Muma doesn’t ride much these days, she got a chance to play with Figeac DC at home over the winter and made it her goal to do one-tempi changes. “It is not easy!” she said with a laugh.
“She doesn’t like me to watch her ride, so she rode by herself quietly in the afternoon,” Susan said of Muma’s sessions with the gelding. “When she felt comfortable, she would send a video, and she learned everything on him, like the whole Grand Prix, she learned, but quietly by herself.
“That was the person who was supposed to enjoy him, the one that cared for him for the last 12 years,” she added. “So that was really fun. I think that horse, for sure, holds a piece of her heart.”
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She also hacks on occasion and has an open invitation to ride a polo pony with Timmy.
“I don’t ride as much as people probably would think, but to be honest, it’s not super important to me. It’s a great added bonus,” she said. “Honestly, just being with them is kind of an everyday adventure.”
Muma considers her job to be the voice of the horses in her care. She and fellow groom Birgit “Bernie” Maier, who worked for show jumper Margie Engle for more than 20 years, take care of Susan’s seven horses.
“I got so lucky; I hit the jackpot,” Muma said of Maier. “She’s incredible. It’s just so nice to have somebody at home that I don’t have to worry about what’s going on at home. She’s just doing the same amount of care as I do, and I think that’s super important to have in any high-performance stable—a good team that you can trust so you can go away to shows. She joined our team this year. I wish I could clone her, so then I could take her everywhere with me!”
Muma is the proudest of her attention to detail, which she feels can get lost in today’s horse world.
“A lot of people skip the part of paying attention to what your horses are just trying to tell you in their everyday life—it just kind of gets lost in the shuffle, and I’m just so fortunate that I can be so hands-on in the stable, and Susie trusts me enough to guide everybody in a way, and we all work together,” she said. “It’s cohesive. I love learning new things every day. Nobody ever knows everything; there’s always something new to be learned and taught and just be observant. And I think that’s why our horses enjoy being with us. We don’t just chuck them in the stall and pull them out to ride. It’s nice when they nicker at you and stuff like that. It makes the job a little bit easier when you know that they appreciate it.”
“We’ve been around the world, back and forth, all around Europe and America,” said Susan. “It’s been quite a journey, and I think long-time grooms like that, they’re gold—to have a good one that you can really rely on. Carly’s more than a groom. She manages me and manages my life and my Instagram and all sorts of things. I mean, you name it, she does it—designs the invitation for a party, makes appointments for me. She’s like a [personal assistant] and a groom and a manager and a friend. When you’re traveling like this away from your family, it’s nice to have somebody that’s a friend, too.
“She’s very knowledgeable and has gotten even more knowledgeable along the way,” she continued. “And I really entrust my horses to her, you know? I have the luxury of just kind of showing up, and everything is organized and done to a T how I like it, and that’s when you feel really lucky.”
Do you know an exceptional groom who deserves to be showcased in our Groom Spotlight section? If so, email kloushin@coth.com to tell us all about that person.
