The 90 percent of the U.S. Eventing Association’s membership who compete at novice and training level got their moment in the spotlight at the inaugural American Eventing Championships on Sept. 16-19 at the Carolina Horse Park in Raeford, N.C.
And Sher Schwartz of Waverly Hall, Ga., winner of the novice championship, was almost overwhelmed with the $5,000 check she earned.
Schwartz was one of four championship winners at the novice level (the open championship she won, plus adult amateur, junior/young rider and horse). Training level offered the same four championships, while preliminary level offered only the open championship and a horse championship, and the intermediate and advanced levels offered only the open championship. But at the three upper levels, the organizers gave ribbons for amateurs and young riders within the championship divisions.
The first-placed open winners at all five levels each earned half the $10,000 purse at each level. But the amateur, junior/young rider and horse divisions didn’t have prize money.
“That’s almost as much as she cost!” exclaimed Schwartz to her husband, Elliot, referring to her horse Jamocean. “I can’t believe I won! I was really intimidated by the number of people and the caliber of people,” she added.
The AEC was truly a stellar event for Sher, a clinical psychologist, and Elliot, a financial advisor. Sher, 53, also finished seventh in the novice championship on Nothing Spared, and their son, Drew, rode in the preliminary championship. And Mike Winter, their trainer, rode their horse Wonderful Will to the preliminary horse championship.
Sher thought she was going to win the 76-horse novice championship on Nothing Spared until he lowered a rail in show jumping, a mistake that put Jamocean on top. Sher said it was the first time Jamocean, a 7-year-old, Thoroughbred mare, had ever beaten Nothing Spared in competition.
“They’re both really solid, and I need that because I’m not the bravest,” said Sher, who only began eventing about three years ago. She’d ridden some as a child and started riding again when Drew caught the eventing bug.
“I was resurrected–I just had to do it,” said Sher, who rides two or three horses in the early morning before work. “And I take a lot of lessons.”
A clean, fast cross-country round–one of only two in the preliminary horse division–put Wonderful Will in the lead over another of Winter’s horses, Kingpin, who’d been tied for third after dressage. Kingpin’s 4.0 time penalties dropped him 1.25 penalties behind Wonderful Will, where he stayed after show jumping. Winter also finished sixth on Daybreak.
“I went slower on Kingpin because he has less mileage,” said Winter. “Will is only 15.1 hands, but he’s so fast, and the track suited him quite well.”
Schwartz said that Wonderful Will, 7, sold for $200,000 as a yearling but had a short and unsuccessful racing career, ending up working as a lead pony at the racetrack. Still, his sire is Woodman, a top steeplechase sire, and speed is in his blood.
Schwartz rides the gelding most of the time, bringing him to Winter to ride the week before events and for jump schools, since he jumps her out of the tack. That’s why Winter will continue to campaign the gelding. They’ve won seven of eight horse trials this season.
Time Matters Most
Schwartz earned her check by finishing the championship-level cross-country course in 4:56, 4 seconds under the optimum time. That’s what broke the tie with Robert Murphy of Lincoln Park, N.J., on Renkum Diamond Jake, 7. Schwartz and Murphy had been tied with 29.5 penalties throughout the competition, but Murphy finished 12 seconds fast.
The training championship division also had to be decided by which of two riders finished closest to the cross-country optimum time. Rachael Lincoln of Southern Pines, N.C., and Jennifer Simmons of Upperville, Va., finished with the identical score (33.75), but Lincoln’s time of 5:07 was perfect, while Simmons finished in 5:03.
Lincoln achieved that time despite being stopped on course at fence 13 during a “cats-and-dogs downpour” on Friday afternoon, about half an hour after organizers halted the training cross-country and preliminary and intermediate dressage. Everybody had returned to action when a weather front moved in suddenly and dumped about 4 inches of rain on the sandy grounds in about 45 minutes. Officials stopped the cross-country action, but dressage continued.
Technical delegate Gretchen Butts and course designer John Williams had measured the courses tightly.
“I just ran, ran, ran, ran, ran, ran, ran” to make the time before she was stopped at fence 13, said Lincoln. But after she started again, “I didn’t pay any attention to the time. I didn’t even restart my watch.”
Lincoln has owned and ridden Kilburn, 16, for four years. She said that the Irish-bred Thoroughbred had competed briefly at preliminary with a previous owner. “He was an absolute superstar. Nobody could ask for more. He was just amazing to keep going in that storm,” she exclaimed.
Lincoln, daughter of dressage judge Barbara Marks, owns her own gourmet catering and take-out business in Southern Pines, appropriately called “Sweet Feed.”
Simmons is a professional trainer and was a last-minute substitute for owner Lysa Hlavinka, who broke her collarbone falling from Everybody Loves Brumby, a 7-year-old U.S.-bred Thoroughbred, at the Loudoun Horse Trials (Va.) three weeks earlier.
While Lincoln had one of the shortest trips to the Carolina Horse Park (about 10 miles), Adrienne Classen had the longest trip–about 3,000 miles from Woodside, Calif.–to win the novice horse championship. That’s why she flew Rafferty’s Rules, a 6-year-old Australian-bred warmblood, to Lexington, Ky., and then drove to North Carolina.
Young Riders Sweep
Some 56 horses contested the preliminary championship, and only 13 of them completed the cross-country course without adding jumping or time penalties to their dressage scores. Nate Chambers of Vienna, Va., added 1.2 time penalties to his 29.5, but he moved into first place when Sinead Halpin and Dunlavin Lights had 7.2 time faults. A double-clear show jumping round on Sunday secured the victory for Chambers, 17, riding Rolling Stone II.
Chambers balances riding with coach Paul Ebersole in Bluemont, Va., with his time as a sophomore at Gonzaga College High School in Washington, D.C. He’s been eventing competitively for two years with 8-year-old Rolling Stone II, his first horse, imported from Germany four years ago.
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Chambers completed a young riders sweep of the preliminary championship. He edged Shawn Price on Jack The Lad and Dana Widstrand on Relentless
Pursuit. Two other young riders also broke into the top 10–Erin Liedle was seventh on The Player and Amanda Glueck was eighth on Jovial. And amateur Roxanne Booth rode Marrakech Express to fourth place with a clear show jumping round.
Chambers used the AEC to qualify for his first one-star event, at Midsouth (Ky.) on Oct. 15-17.
“My horse was fabulous in dressage,” he said. “As I walked my minute markers on cross-country, my No. 1 priority was still to qualify for the one-star. When I saw my score, I thought, ‘You’ve got to be kidding me!’ “
To deal with the pressure of being in the lead in show jumping, Chambers walked the course four times, twice with his coach. “Paul really helped me out,” he said. “He kept me calm and focused. He keeps me on course.”
Chambers said he put his trust in his horse, nicknamed “Rolex.”
“With this horse, if I keep my concentration, even if I bury him at a jump, he’ll get over. I had a little ‘last-fenceitis,’ and he saved me there,” said Chambers.
Chambers mentioned that he appreciates that his parents, Bill and Genna, who do not ride, have made it possible for him to compete. “They’ve sacrificed so much for me,” he said. “My dad drives an old car, and my mom doesn’t have living room furniture because they want me to pursue my dream. I couldn’t do it without them.”
Claire Williams and coach Lelo Reeves made a 17-hour drive from West Newbury, Mass. (north of Boston) so she could ride Top American Paint to the novice junior/young rider championship. It was the first time Williams, 15, had ever competed outside of New England, without her parents.
Williams, a C-3 member of Pentucket Pony Club, said Top American Paint is the 9-year-old gelding’s registered name. “I thought it was really cool when we got him [he was 3 and I was 9], but now I think it’s kind of dorky. I’d change it if I could,” she said.
Williams calls the 14.3-hand Paint, who has two blue eyes, “Merlin,” after the wizard. “He’s a really funny horse–he’s sweet, but he doesn’t like many people. My mom and I are the only people who’ve ridden him since we’ve owned him,” said Williams. “He has a very cat-like personality, but he tries his heart out for me. As grumpy as he is on the ground, once I put the bit in his mouth, he’s a really good boy.”
Williams and Merlin took over the lead with a faultless cross-country round, right on the optimum time of 5:00. She hadn’t measured the course or done anything special to achieve that perfection. She only found out the time (at 400 mpm) was hard to make in the warm-up area. “I just went. I’d walked pretty tight turns because he’s small and can make them, and I just set a faster pace,” she said.
Williams planned to move Merlin up to training level the week after the AEC, at UNH (N.H.), but Amanda Glueck, the training level junior/young rider winner, is already competing at preliminary level. Glueck, 20, rode Jovial to eighth place in the preliminary championship, and she plans to move Kabor up this winter.
Glueck and Kabor took a five-point lead in dressage (scoring 25.75), enough to overcome a dislodged rail in show jumping. Like Williams, she finished right on the optimum time of 5:07. It was the pair’s sixth victory this year.
Williams’ mother bought Kabor, a 15.2-hand Dutch Warmblood, two years ago to be a dressage horse, but she tried eventing him and “he was awesome; he really took to it.” And now her mother doesn’t have a horse.
Glueck lives in Versailles, Ky., and next year she and a friend will enroll in nearby Georgetown College on a full eventing scholarship. She said they’re the first two students to receive this scholarship. She moved from the Houston area two years ago to event, and her goal is to ride at the four-star level.
“Ran Like Crazy”
Beth Weisberger, winner of the training amateur championship, also led from the start, on Simply Stated, but her more modest goal is to ride her Thoroughbred-Morgan gelding in the Midsouth CCI* a year from now.
Weisberger, a small-animal veterinarian from Dayton, Ohio, has already done about half a dozen preliminary horse trials with Simply Stated. Still, the cross-country course “was much harder than any training I’ve ever seen. It was comparable with some of the smaller prelims we’ve done,” she said.
Weisberger carefully calculated her speed to also hit the optimum time of 5:00 exactly. She found her minute markers at a speed of 500 mpm instead of 475 mpm. “And we ran like crazy,” she added.
D.C. McBroom rode Woodbine to win the novice amateur championship by finishing the cross-country course 11 seconds fast. Only one other horse in the 14-horse division finished without time faults.
McBroom, of Floyd, Va., is an indefatigable volunteer and supporter of eventing competitions. She rode in two Adult Team Championships last year, has just stepped down as the Area II chairman, and helped out as a jump judge at the AEC after her cross-country rounds on Woodbine in the amateur division and Due South in the novice championship (on whom she finished ninth).
McBroom bought “Woody,” a pinto, sight-unseen from an internet advertisement five years ago, but six months later he three-quarter severed his right hind flexor tendon and was given only a small chance of survival. “I wasn’t willing to accept that,” said McBroom, and after considerable medical care, a year later he won his first event.
But she won’t ever compete Woody higher than novice because of the old injury. “He’s just a true packer. He has a button on the side of his neck you just push,” she said with a smile.
They Have To Respect The Jumps
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John Williams, who designed the American Eventing Championship courses for novice, training and preliminary levels, endured a lot of sweating and swearing (mostly at him) before the lower-level riders took on his courses. But most were calmer–some were even elated–after they finished.
It seemed he’d accomplished what course designers often set out to do–scare the hell out of the riders while creating a course that horses jump well.
The key, said Williams, is to make jumps that horses and riders respect. That makes riders focus and encourages horses to jump correctly. So he created single jumps and combinations that were maximum-sized and imposing, that required riders to come forward and to hold their lines. There were questions–including trakehners at novice and training level and a 90-degree turn to the second training level water–that some had never encountered before.
“What I was trying to accomplish was to make enough of a challenge at all of those levels to be sure the best horses would be rewarded,” said Williams, who increased the challenge by measuring the courses using tight turns between fences. “Quite often the best horses don’t get rewarded because the lesser horses cross the finish line with the same score.”
He admitted that the jumps “were at the utmost of difficulty for the level.” And he said courses, especially at a championship, “should be measured taking the lines that the best horse and rider will take. Measuring it generously puts the best horse at a disadvantage.”
One of the most penalized jumps on the novice course was fence 3, a table. Horse after horse slammed into it as riders galloped them into it, and some refused or lost their riders.
“Too few people have an understanding of what’s a good balance for their horses to jump out of at the gallop,” said Williams, who hoped his courses helped championship participants learn that feeling. “It’s a learning curve we all have to climb,” he added.
Three of the winners finished right on the optimum time (Rachael Lincoln and Amanda Glueck at training level, and Claire Williams at novice), and novice horse winner Adrienne Classen was 1 second slow.
Overall, 83 of 115 novice horses had no jumping faults (34 with no time faults); 87 of 147 training horses had no jumping faults (34 with no time faults); and 57 of 79 preliminary horses had no jumping faults (15 with no time faults).
“They were true championship courses–just beautiful,” said Glueck.
“It was challenging but inviting. There wasn’t anything I was really worried about,” said Lincoln.
“It was one of the hardest courses I’ve ever ridden,” said Claire Williams. J.S.
Bouckaert Keeps Her Lead
The advanced and intermediate sections attracted fewer entries than the lower level divisions (31 at intermediate and 27 at advanced), but the caliber of the contestants was of the highest quality, and the battle for top placing was fierce.
In the advanced championship, Kim Severson, who brought home the individual silver medal from the Athens Olympics in August, took the dressage lead on Royal Venture. But an accident in the stables on Saturday morning, in which she was thrown from a training level horse and stepped on by another horse, sent her to the hospital and forced her to withdraw all of her entries, including her three advanced horses. Severson was released from the hospital and was coaching with a stiff neck on Sunday.
Severson’s withdrawal opened the door for Nathalie Bouckaert, riding father Carl Bouckaert’s West Farthing, to take over after placing sixth in dressage. Bouckaert had the fastest time in the Saturday afternoon drizzle, finishing 18 seconds slow (7.2 time faults) on the sandy footing. Husband Michael Pollard had the next-fastest time (34 seconds slow) to eventually finish fourth.
Bouckaert, who lost the lead in show jumping at both the 2003 Foxhall Cup CCI*** (Ga.) and April’s Rolex Kentucky CCI****, has been getting counseling from sports psychologist Jack Llewellyn, who also works with the Atlanta Braves baseball team. Visualizing her ride before she competes has helped her, as has refining her own position in the saddle.
Since she was short-listed for the Olympics, she also spent part of the summer training with team coach Capt. Mark Phillips.
Bouckaert also schools West Farthing over fences twice a week. “I don’t think it’s fair to make the horse jump too much, but I have to practice. I have to learn somehow,” she reasoned.
Bouckaert and West Farthing lowered one rail but stayed easily in front of Karen O’Connor and Grand Slam, who displaced three rails. O’Connor didn’t go home without a championship ribbon, though, since she rode A Phar Cry (a 7-year-old Thoroughbred who stands 15.1 hands) to the training horse title.
Since he entered the intermediate championship’s final show jumping phase in sixth place, Mark Weissbecker felt no pressure as he piloted Decordova around the course. Weissbecker had already ridden three horses to top-10 championship finishes, but it was this last ride that finally sent him back to his Southern Pines home a champion when rail after rail fell for the riders in front of him.
“He was very brave this weekend, and he felt fabulous on cross-country,” said Weiss-becker of Decordova.
Weissbecker found the 8-year-old pinto gelding, by Fine Art (a son of Samber, sire of the prepotent pinto sire Art Deco) out of a Thoroughbred mare, in a field in upstate New York as a yearling. He purchased him through horse dealer David Hopper, from whom Weissbecker regularly buys horses. Owned by Birch Hill Farm in Pittsfield, Mass., Decordova is now heading for the Fair Hill CCI*** (Md.) on Oct. 15-17.
Weissbecker, a two-time Fair Hill winner, said that he enjoyed the inaugural American Eventing Championships.
“I saw an awful lot of excited amateurs and young riders,” he said. “It made it so much fun and it was well deserved. The girl who lost first place in my division [Sue Berrill] told me that nothing can take away from her being here and how well her dressage and cross-country went. She had the best spirit and attitude.”
Amber Heintzberger