It certainly wasn’t as if Jennifer Webster was lacking for things to do with her time—she had a full-time job, a husband and two young sons, a horse to ride and several more to care for at home.

But when Webster’s mare Campside was “not quite right” last fall, her veterinarian, Kevin Keane, issued a treatment plan that would be a tall order for most riders, much less an amateur with a life and a family.

The prescription? Ride her horse. Every day for at least 90 days, no days off. In the winter.

Webster, 45, of Saint Thomas, Pa., had purchased Campside as a 6-year-old in the spring of 2012. The off-the-track Thoroughbred mare (Forest Camp—Eastside Ballad, Saint Ballado) had done well showing and foxhunting, but had some soundness issues related to shoeing in 2014 that required time off. Then she just wasn’t the same when Webster tried to leg her up again that fall… and the dwindling daylight and iffy riding weather in November wasn’t helping.

The mare had been checked over stem to stern, X-rayed and ultrasounded, but no physical cause had been found. Keane suspected the mare needed a more consistent program to get back to normal after extended time off, and some intensive flatwork.

So he prescribed three to four months of riding, every single day.

Webster’s first thought: “How am I going to do this?!”

She kept her horses at home and didn’t have an indoor arena, so the first step was to call her old friend, eventer Packy McGaughan. Webster had ridden with McGaughan as a teenager, and even accompanied him to the 1987 Pan Am Games in Indianapolis as a groom. McGaughan’s Banbury Cross Farms in Clarksburg, Md., had an indoor, and wasn’t too far from Webster’s job as associate publisher at The Equiery, a Maryland-focused equestrian publication, in Lisbon, Md. And McGaughan is well-known for his attention to dressage—or, as Keane had jokingly told Webster, not the kind of flatwork “that you hunter people do.”

“So I’m reaching into my pocket, with a budget I didn’t really have,” Webster recalled, laughing, and she moved Campside to McGaughan’s for the winter during the last week of January 2015.

McGaughan had suggested blogging or journaling about her progress as a way to stay motivated, track her successes (and failures), and keep her committed. So, of course, Webster turned to Facebook, and with an apology to her friends for filling up their timelines with the minutia of her riding, she kept a daily chronicle of what she was doing with Campside.

“It kind of took off; people really got into it and looked forward to it,” she recalled. Even Campside’s old owners and trainers from her racing days were following along. “Knowing that others were watching and waiting to hear what the next day brought made it that much easier to put on the boots and breeches, overtop of four layers, when the mercury barely hit 20 degrees some days!”

Three weeks into the adventure, she called Keane and glowingly reported that her horse had returned to her previous self. They stayed with McGaughan through Easter, and Webster could recall missing only about five rides during that time. Her two sons—Thomas, 6, and George, 3—often accompanied her, zipped snugly into their snowsuits, and spent their time playing with toy trucks and tractors in the corner of the indoor arena.

For Webster, it was a reminder of the importance of horsemanship and a consistent program, and the value in seeing your horse every single day. It’s part of the reason why she normally keeps Campside at home on her husband Chauncey’s family farm, along with a companion horse and two ponies that may someday be pressed into duty for her sons, if they eventually tire of trucks and tractors.

And the “boot camp” paid off. She and Campside had a successful year showing—albeit sparingly, going for quality, not quantity—in both Maryland Horse Show Association recognized shows, and the Thoroughbred Alliance Show Series, which the Equiery sponsors.

She also hunted Campside with Potomac Hunt, and on a whim, decided to do Hunt Night at both Warrenton (Va.) and the Pennsylvania National. Warrenton was Campside’s first time showing at 3’ (a height she’d jumped for the first time two days before the show), and the pair finished second in their over-fences class. A month later at the Pennsylvania National, they upgraded to a blue ribbon, topping a field of 26 over fences in the field hunter, over 35, class and also placing fifth with the Potomac Hunt team entry.

Focusing on consistency over the winter enabled Jennifer Webster and Campside to excel in shows like the Totally Thoroughbred show at Pimlico racecourse (Md.). Photo by Linda Davis/Spotted Dog Photography

Like most amateurs, especially those with families, Webster’s equestrian endeavors are just one of many plates she keeps spinning at any given time. Her husband has a landscaping business and is usually out of the house at 5 a.m., so she gets the kids up, gets them dressed and fed, and drives them to school. She’s currently enjoying being in a place where the kids are old enough to dress and feed themselves… but not yet old enough to need ferrying to baseball or soccer practices every day after school! Five years from now, she acknowledged, other priorities with her kids may force riding to the back burner for a while.

“Once you have kids, you just don’t own your schedule anymore,” Webster said, noting that it drove her crazy for the first couple of years after she had her oldest son, and she could see the difference in her horse when she wasn’t riding consistently enough.

But as this competition year comes to a close, Webster is looking forward to “Winter 201”—going back to McGaughan’s for a couple months and building on the education gleaned from the “Winter 101” class. And she knows that she’s found the solution that will put her horse back on track when things get derailed, so doesn’t feel as anxious about life occasionally getting in the way of horsemanship.

“We don’t have millions in the bank; we’re a working family. And I want to raise my kids!” she added emphatically. She relies heavily on family members and makes judicious use of a part-time nanny to help free up time in her schedule to accomplish horsey goals, and also leave time for more family pursuits, like helping out at school.

Opening hunt fell on Halloween this year, and she chose (with a twinge of regret) to go trick-or-treating with her sons instead because there’s an opening hunt every year, but there are only so many years where moms are welcome to come along on Halloween!

But Webster also notes that parents can sometimes be sucked into letting their lives revolve around their children more than is realistic, and in ways that may actually be detrimental toward raising a competent next generation of humans. She considers herself a very goal-oriented person, and riding and competing help to meet that need.

“[Riding] gives back to me,” she said simply.