The sight of headlights lighting up a darkened, quiet stable; the clumsy unloading of shavings and equipment by moonlight; searching for spigots and filling buckets in an unfamiliar barn in the dark–this is arriving at an event, Melissa Roddy-style.

Since she’s a full-time newspaper reporter, she frequently pulls into horse trials in the middle of the night, after working at The Steamboat Pilot & Today, in Steamboat Springs, Colo., until 7 p.m., then driving to her barn to hook up her trailer and head off into the night.

“There was no getting to events early,” she said with a laugh.

Once, while competing at High Prairie (Colo.), Roddy arrived late Wednesday night, rode her dressage on Thursday, drove four hours back to Steamboat to work on Friday, and returned to jump on Saturday.

“My horse is getting older, so he doesn’t really need the time to get used to the show grounds, but they’re stiff when they get off the trailer, and you want to hack around, to loosen them up,” she said. “I’m always jealous when I pull in sometimes and everyone else looks so relaxed, but at least I’m there. It’s creative budgeting.”

Although she moved to Delaware for a new job at the Wilmington News Journal in September, Roddy lived in Steamboat Springs for 2 1/2 years. Despite the challenge of a full-time job and the long drives to events, she and Never Summer completed their first advanced event this summer at Wayne (Ill.).

When Roddy lived in Steamboat Springs, she kept her horse 20 minutes from her home and office. “I never knew when I was going to be home at night–it could be 6 o’clock; it could be 11 o’clock,” she said. “If I planned on riding after work, something would inevitably come up, so whatever was most important to me, I had to do that before work.”

After packing her clothes for work in the morning, she would go ride, then eat a Luna bar and kid’s juice box in the car on the way to work. “I’d sneak in through the back door, give myself a French shower in the locker room, rub the hardhat dent out of my forehead, and stroll into the office like I just got there,” she said with a laugh.

Roddy worked Tuesdays through Saturdays, and the shortest drive she had to an event was four hours. “I used my vacation sometimes, but my boss was great,” she said. “To a point, he was flexible. I’d either work every day or night shifts before a trip. I’d work a couple of weeks non-stop.”

Roddy befriended fellow event rider Christian Eagles to help her make long road trips. “I’d seen her name in the results, and I knew she was from Wyoming, so I called and said, ‘You don’t know me, but do you want to go on a road trip to California?’ “

The pair pulled an all-nighter to compete in the Galway Downs CIC** (Calif.) in April. “We pulled an all-nighter through a snowstorm in Utah, then I saw Vegas in the day time, and I practically ran off the road rubbernecking,” Roddy said.

Beyond Expectations
Roddy bought Never Summer as a 4-year-old off the track, and by the time she was going training level, she decided to devote some time to her own riding education. She saved up her money and took six months off to work with Denny Emerson.

“I had no car or house payment, and I knew if I was ever going to do it, this was the time,” she said. Roddy did her first three-day then, at Bromont (Canada), in 2001, finishing 13th.

But she knew the foray into full-time riding was temporary, and she didn’t mind. She worked for Practical Horseman for 1 1/2 years  in Pennsylvania, but the newspaper called her back again, and she returned to Steamboat.

“I like daily deadlines, the energy of it,” she said.

When she moved to Colorado, Roddy expected that the time and financial constraints would keep her at the preliminary level. But she met Martha Deeds, an event trainer near Denver, who had a profound effect on her cross-country control, and Beatrice Marienau, who helped her with her dressage. Roddy would drive 4 1/2 hours to Deeds on her days off for lessons.

By 2004, Roddy started posting clear rounds at intermediate. Then, this summer, the pair finished seventh in the advanced division at Wayne (Ill.).

“We’re not really advanced riders yet, but after the two-star [at Galway Downs] and Wayne, I had such a sense of accomplishment. I got a ribbon at Wayne, and standing there in the awards ceremony, I thought, ‘And this is with a day job.’ I never really have a next goal, but it was exciting to do that.”

Even while she was competing at a higher level than she’d ever expected, things weren’t ideal for Roddy.

“You wish you could do more–go to that clinic or put a whole season together so while we’re on a roll, we could keep going,” she said. “But you inconvenience everyone [at work] so much to get to one event, and it’s a bummer when that doesn’t go well. Steamboat is under snow at least through April. So in the fall or winter, there’s not a next event and nowhere really to school. But some things are just a fact of life.”

Packing It All In
In addition to working and riding, Roddy frequently succumbed to the many outdoor temptations in Steamboat. She would rollerblade with a co-worker at lunchtime, and she also enjoyed mountain biking and snowboarding.

“Lots of times my girlfriends were doing mountain-bike trips, and that always seemed to coincide with High Prairie [Horse Trials],” she said. “Sometimes we’d be snowboarding, and my friends would go have beers afterwards, but I’d change my clothes, even though I would be exhausted, and go ride.”

Roddy tries to be asleep by 10 or 10:30 p.m., and she’s usually up at 5:45 or 6 a.m., starting her day with a workout for her abdominal muscles. “I love Abs Of Steel,” she said.

“I don’t stop,” she admitted. “I have everything down to a science–it went bam, bam, bam.”

Now that Roddy has returned to the East Coast, she doesn’t expect things to change dramatically. Although there are more events and coaches nearby, she said most of the well-known riders aren’t available to teach her on weekends, when she has time off. She recently had a 7 a.m. lesson with Missy Ransehousen.

But she doesn’t mind the challenge of doing it all.

“I wouldn’t give up my job; I don’t have the desire to do [the horses] full-time,” she said. “It keeps everything in perspective. If you have a bad day with the horse, you go to work and realize it’s not everything, and when you have a bad day at work, your horse is there.”

Roddy admitted to wondering what her horse could do with a more experienced rider. “But I think of all he does, despite me,” she said. “I do this for fun, and there’s nothing more fun than jumping my horse when he’s on.”

Melissa Roddy
Age: 31

Hometown: Wilmington, Del.

Education: University of Colorado at Boulder

Profession: Journalist

Horse: Never Summer, 12-year-old, brown Thoroughbred gelding, by Prospectors Halo–Black Bess, bought as a 4-year-old with a severely bowed tendon. He competes in eventing, completing his first advanced in July.

Doubts? “I’ve had times when I’ve thought, ‘I just can not do this. The job’s too big; I don’t have the time. I should sell him,'” said Roddy. “But this is our equivalent of snowboarding or rollerblading. We do it for fun. We work hard and save up our money, so if we choose to do this with our spare time, it’s got to be fun. I’ve definitely gone through stages where the fences looked big and I didn’t think it was fun.”