When Dinette Neuteboom, the founder of HorseGrooms, asked FEI show jumping groom Shay Stenchever what she believed was missing in the groom community, Stenchever’s response was simple: a lack of education and accessibility to education.
“We now have this wonderful medium that is social media to share information on,” Shenchever said. “Dinette asked me if I would mind doing some short how-to videos that she could share with the HorseGrooms community. I will never say that my way is the only way or the best way, but it’s the way that works for me. If there’s someone out there struggling with something, I would love to be able to help them find a solution.”
When she started sharing “how-to” reels on her social media earlier this year, her goal was to help teach viewers how to better care for their horses. Over the past several months, Stenchever has created 16 educational grooming reels and posted them to her social media channels. One video, which demonstrates her trick for putting EquiFit HorseSox on a big-footed horse, has garnered 533,000 views (and counting) on Instagram.
“For years, I’ve been so hungry to learn,” she said. “A lot of people at the top keep their secrets very guarded because they don’t want to give others an advantage over them, but I’m so the opposite of that. I don’t like gatekeeping information. I’m not out here to get famous—I’m just trying to share what I’ve spent so many years learning.”
Stenchever, 28, has been grooming at the FEI level for nearly a decade, working for Olympians Karl Cook (United States) and Cian O’Connor (Ireland), Irish rider Nicky Galligan, Australian rider Paige Jardine, and Swedish rider Hanna Mauritzson. When Stenchever worked for Cook, she spent a lot of time learning from his trainer, French rider Eric Navet.
“He’s a legend; I learned something new every day,” Stenchever said. “Eric had so much attention to detail, and if there was one hair wrong, he would notice. You would never be in trouble—he would never, ever be angry or raise his voice. But he would be very happy to educate you on the way that things could be, and he always had a ‘why.’ ”
Recognizing the “why” resonated with Stenchever. Working for a diverse group of people taught her that each rider does things differently, and while she’s happy to adapt, she wanted to learn why they do something a particular way. Stenchever has tied this theory into her reels, always explaining the horsemanship reason behind how she does something a certain way.
ADVERTISEMENT
A Unique Upbringing
Growing up in Seattle, Stenchever’s parents had horses in her backyard, but they were not show horses. As Stenchever’s interest in the horses grew, her parents purchased western trail and barrel racing horses for her to practice on. They also owned draft horses, which Stenchever learned how to drive.
“We also had miniature horses and rabbits that we showed to the top level of those circuits too,” Stenchever said. “It was a very different upbringing—I got to learn so many different things. I’ve dabbled in almost every discipline except for polo.”
At age 16, she went to groom at Emerald Downs, the local racetrack her family frequented. Shortly after, the Cavalia equestrian show, developed by the co-founder of Cirque du Soleil, came into town, and Stenchever learned that Lezlie Wolff, who does the media for Emerald Downs, was attending the show.
“I remember seeing Cavalia as a kid, and I loved it so much,” she said. “So I begged Lezlie to let me come with her to the media day at Cavalia. … We got to go backstage and meet all the grooms and artists and see that it’s a real job that people do.”
Stenchever spent the next two years applying online every month to be a groom or rider for the show. “I didn’t care what they wanted me to do—I would have done anything,” she said. “I just wanted to be a part of this amazing show.”
When she turned 18, Cavalia finally reached out to Stenchever. The show was then located in China, and she was now old enough for the globe-trotting experience. She was the youngest person they’d hired, and she had two weeks to relocate. Stenchever spent just over a year working for Cavalia in Zhangzhou and Hong Kong.
“I loved working for them—I loved the people, the horses, all of it,” she said. “I was there for the last few shows that the original show did, and if Cavalia had not been petering out at that time, I would have stayed with them for the rest of my life. It was an incredible experience.”
Ten years later, Stenchever still uses some of the techniques she learned at Cavalia with the horses in her care. Both at horse shows and at home, she opts to keep her horses busy on handwalks, taking them into the warm-up rings and making them do half-pass, shoulder-in and haunches-in from the ground instead of aimlessly walking the horses in circles around the barns.
“So much of Cavalia was about the relationship you had with the horse,” Stenchever said. “The horse is only on stage for 2-3 minutes at a time, and they do the same act every single night. It was always mental gymnastics to keep the horses entertained the rest of the time. We did so much liberty work and work off of their backs that I learned that this can be fun for them, and you don’t have to constantly be sitting on the horse and working them. We don’t love when our life is work, sleep, work, sleep—you can have a little bit of play in there. I think it makes the horses so much happier, all around.”
ADVERTISEMENT
Utilizing Her Skills
Currently, Stenchever works for up-and-coming grand prix rider Stella Buckingham at her Queen Of England Farm in Wellington, Florida. Originally, they connected while Stenchever was working for Galligan, who was Buckingham’s in-house trainer at the time. But once Galligan returned home to Ireland, Stenchever shifted to working full-time for Buckingham, who now trains with Carly Anthony. For the past three years, Stenchever has overseen the daily care of Buckingham’s string of six horses alongside fellow grooms Antonio Sandoval and Adan Gayden.
“We joke around the barn that it’s the Shay and Stella show here,” she said. “Stella really wants to be a horsewoman and learn how to do things. When I started working for her, she had just transitioned from riding mostly equitation and hunter horses and had just started jumping some of the medium/high junior jumpers. Now she has done a lot of two-star and three-star grand prix [classes].”
As Stenchever watched her EquiFit video go viral, she suddenly realized the videos could not only be educational but could benefit both her and Buckingham. She recognized the difficulty of finding sponsors as a young professional and thought they could use the organic content to build a partnership with EquiFit and other similar companies.
“That got me thinking in another way: everyone wants to sponsor a rider and a top rider. But how many people sponsor grooms? Nobody,” she said. “And who is using the products? Who is having to know how to use the products? Who is telling their friends about the products? It’s all the network of grooms.”
Stenchever reached out to several companies that she uses in the barn, including Corro and Stable Secretary, and shared her idea with them with great success. “It’s an opportunity for these companies to work with me while I build a social media following,” Stenchever said. “I posed the question, ‘How can we work together to have something mutually beneficial for both parties?’ Then Stella would get some help as a young rider, and I would get the things that I need to take the best care of the horses.”
Stenchever looks forward to continuing to support Buckingham on her FEI journey, especially since Stenchever has always wanted to be at the top of the sport but doing it on her own wasn’t financially feasible. She’s thrilled to do it alongside an up-and-comer.
“If you try to get a job working for a [grand prix] rider who’s already doing [the five-star] level, they already have a groom who’s taking those top horses to those top shows,” she said. “And that groom has been with that rider for years. So it’s not something that you can buy your way in as a groom, unless you get really, really lucky. You have to know going into it that it’s going to take years to build a rapport with a rider, and that’s just part of it. You’ve got to find someone that you believe in and you can trust, and for me, that’s Stella.”
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.
