For Jessica Pye, this year’s CN North American Young Riders Championships CCI** competition couldn’t have gone much better. She and Carte Blanche led
from the dressage and never surrendered their position, also leading the Area V team to the gold medal.

But as she took an impromptu victory lap after the completion of her winning show jumping round, pumping the air and patting her horse, she just couldn’t fight back tears.

“This horse has had a storybook young riders career,” she said of the 16-year-old Thoroughbred whose final event was the NAYRC. “He’s earned three individual [NAYRC] medals and done the Red Hills [Fla.] and North Georgia three-stars. I’ll never have another like him, ever.”

Pye, of Lewisville, Texas, started her horse at beginner novice eight years ago, and despite being blind in his left eye and having significant soundness issues, they claimed the individual NAYRC silver medal last year and won the NAYRC one-star in 2002.

“I thought my good luck might stay in Tempel [Farms (Ill.), where I’ve earned my previous titles],” said Pye, who trains with Area V team coach Mike Huber. “The challenge here [at the Virginia Horse Center] was the hills, but it was a great [cross-country] course. It rode well, even for horses who aren’t used to the hills.”

The Area V riders, from the flatlands of Texas, didn’t have any problem with the hilly terrain of David O’Connor’s course. “We did lots of gallops on the track to prepare,” said Pye.

The team included Pye, Ashley Bailey-Classen, Rebecca Brown and Bonner Carpenter. “We’re all friends outside of [young riders],” said Pye. “Area V is a close-knit group; most of us are around Dallas. We’re all friends outside of this program, so when we get put together on a team, it’s great.”

The team preparation included a week of training at Bailey-Classen’s parents’ Norm-andy Farm near Dallas. “We had so much support from our parents and sponsors, and we raised a lot of money, with an auction, a fund-raising dinner, selling Area V apparel and raffle tickets, and from individual sponsors,” said Pye.

And they credited Huber for their performances. “Mike has been awesome,” said Bailey-Classen. “He said if we came home with the gold medal, he’d kiss all the horses, and he did.”

“He’s been our shrink and our dad and our coach,” added Pye.

Pye was pleased that the NAYRC event ran short format for the first time this year. “I have an older horse, so I wouldn’t have been here if it had been long format,” she said.

Brown agreed, but Bailey-Classen, 19, of Keller, Texas, was disappointed to have the short format. “He was spectacular, but a little too fit maybe,” Bailey-Classen said with a laugh of her 8-year-old, Irish Sport Horse, Ballynoe Rum. “He’s young, and he’s still settling.”

Carpenter competed in the 2003 NAYRC and was selected for last year’s Area V team, but her horse was injured a few days before leaving for the competition. She purchased Acapulco Jazz, a 14-year-old, Mexican Quarter Horse, three years ago from Megan Larson.

“The dressage was not our best, but on cross-country he was on the whole time. He was fast as usual, and he jumped well,” she said. “And we had one of our best show jumping rounds.”

Carpenter, 17, of Dallas, placed fourth individually. She plans to move up to advanced next year when she’s old enough.

Now that she’s competed at the NAYRC aboard Twinkle Toes, Brown will take the fall semester away from horses to focus on school. “I might get to go to the [American Eventing Championships], but that’s it for the fall,” she said. “I’ll be back at it in the spring.”

Brown and “Twinkie,” a 15.2-hand horse she’s owned since he was 2, won the Jersey Fresh CCI** (N.J.) in May. She trains with her mother, Becky Brown, and with Jim Wofford and Rainey Andrews.

“This was so much fun, and I’m so glad I got to do it,” she said of the NAYRC.

Ashker Claims Silver

Laine Ashker of Area II claimed the individual silver medal with Frodo Baggins, a 10-year-old, New Zealand-bred Thoroughbred she bought after seeing a photo of him. “I just really liked him,” she said. “I thought he was beautiful.”

Ashker, 20, of Crozier, Va., rebounded from a bad fall with Eight Saint James Place at the Rolex Kentucky CCI**** in April, where she broke her neck, to make it back aboard in time for the NAYRC. Now she hopes Frodo Baggins will be making the move up to advanced soon. But he has already had an exciting life, including being part of a Lord Of The Rings film.

“I didn’t know that until his former owner, Carolyn Jolley, sent me pictures of him on the red carpet with Elijah Wood,” said Ashker.

This was Ashker’s third–and last–trip to the NAYRC. “I loved the experience here.

We had an amazing team, coach and parents,” she said.

O’Connor created an entirely new course for the CCI**. “I was paying attention to the terrain and expecting 90-degree weather, so I picked a middle distance,” he said. “It surprised me that it was easy to get the time, but if it had been hot, it would have been a different story. The riders rode it great; it produced a good picture.”

O’Connor was disappointed that only two riders tried the direct route at fence 11AB, which had a skinny triple brush five strides down the hill from a steep drop. “Once they found out [early on] that they could make the time [going the long route], no one risked it,” he said.

Area II Sweeps One-Star Gold

Area II collected two more medals when Nate Chambers led his teammates to the one-star title while winning individually aboard Rolling Stone II.
Chambers, 18, of Vienna, Va., took the lead in dressage aboard his 9-year-old, Hessen gelding. He received the horse, picked out in Germany by his former trainer Britta Johnson, as a Christmas present almost five years ago.

“I had a blast cross-country,” said Chambers, who now trains with Paul Ebersole. “My stomach was in a knot right before I went in [to show jump], and David O’Connor said to me that no matter what happens, you’re the same person when you come out, and that really helped.”

Chambers and teammates Alexandra Zavoyna, Julia Ward, and Madeleine Black-man, had an eight-day training camp at Waredaca Farm, in Laytonsville, Md., to work with team coach Carol Kozlowski in early July. “We’ve spent the last two or three weeks together,” said Chambers, who especially enjoyed the team aspect of the competition. “After your ride, everyone is there and you get a big roar–it’s so cool!”

This fall, Chambers plans to return to the AEC, where he won the preliminary division last year, and he hopes to move up to intermediate. After graduating from high school, he’ll take a year off to ride.

“I like the short format better for my horse. He’s such a great horse, I want him to last as long as he can,” he said of the only horse he’s ever evented.
On Merloch, Zavoyna won the intermediate horse trial at the Virginia Horse Center in May, and she hopes to compete at the Radnor Hunt CCI** (Pa.) in October. “He’s never questioned anything I’ve asked him to do,” she said of the gray, 8-year-old New Zealand-bred. “There were some things on the cross-country I’d never seen before, but he jumped it like a champ.”

Ward said her Squeezable Softly isn’t really a chestnut mare. “We give each other a lot of confidence,” said Ward, of North Poto-mac, Md. “She’s my first preliminary horse.”

Ward trains with Phillip Dutton, Liza Horan, and Judy McGaughan.

Blackman has been riding Meadow Sparrow, a 7-year-old Connemara-Thoroughbred cross, for two years. She bought the little palomino from her trainer Buck Davidson. “She’s amazing,” said Blackman, 15, of Flemington, N.J.

The Area II riders thought that competing in their home area gave them an advantage. “We’ve all ridden here [at the Virginia Horse Center],” said Chambers. “Dr. [Kent] Allen worked with all the horses, and it’s nice to have your home vet here.”

Organizers Brian and Penny Ross also offered a third eventing division this year, a full-format, non-championship CCI* for riders up to 21 years. Jessica diGenova of Team Canada won the event aboard Upolo, ahead of Area V’s Christina Nichols on Candycane Rain.

Two-star rider Sofia Lombera of Mexico earned the Capt. Andrew B. de Szinay Memorial Sportsmanship Trophy, presented to the rider who best personifies the high standards and virtues of integrity, sportsmanship, honor, courage, team spirit, good temper and unselfishness.

The award honors the memory of de Szinay, teacher, dressage judge, technical delegate and long-time friend and supporter of the young riders program.
Lombera finally made it to the champion-ships in her last year as a young rider. Her horse failed the first horse inspection, and when she was offered a re-inspection, she decided that her horse wasn’t 100 percent and chose not to risk an injury just so that she could finally ride in the championships.

Instead, she withdrew him and spent the week supporting her teammates.