As the race heats up for the FEI Rolex World Cup Finals, to be held in Las Vegas, Nev., in April, the West Coast riders are battling it out for points. Only two riders from the West Coast league will qualify, and the results of the $75,000 HITS Grand Prix CSI-W, the finale of HITS Desert Circuit II in Thermal, Calf., made the World Cup Final picture even more complicated.

Mandy Porter’s win aboard Summer earned her 20 points and gave her a total of 87, moving her into the top three and into contention. Richard Spooner–who has competed in World Cup Finals in 2000, ’02, ’03, ’04 and ’05–had held the lead going into the $75,000 class, but lost it to Jill Humphrey, 24.

Spooner rode Cristallo to an eight-fault first round, putting them 14th in the class and adding only five World Cup points, bringing him to a 93-point total and bumping him to second place.

Humphrey has been the one to beat recently. Riding for Rudy Leone out of Sacramento, the Bakersfield, Calif., native earned 17 points for her second-placed finish with Kaskaya. This gave them a total of 94 points and the West Coast lead. The race to Las Vegas was well and truly joined, with five qualifying classes remaining.

Porter had a bad cold on Sunday and could speak only in a whisper. The California professional soldiered on regardless and rode Wild Turkey Farm’s Summer to the win. Asked about how it felt to be riding sick, Porter just shook her head. “You don’t think about it,” she said.

There was plenty in Leopoldo Palacios’ course to think about, though. “The horses were looking at different things, which is normal for Leopoldo,” Porter said. “He always sets things that create little questions that maybe the riders don’t expect.”

Should she qualify for the World Cup Finals, it would be Porter’s first. She did travel to Las Vegas in 2005, to compete in the national-level grand prix that was held during the World Cup Finals. It was a good chance to give her Belgian mare some experience at the top levels indoors. “We weren’t quite ready to do the finals, so it was good that it worked out that way last time,” she said.

The Heat Is On
Kelly Straeter’s new hunter is named Sin City, a synonym to many for Las Vegas. Inevitably the Dutch-bred gelding is called “Vegas” around the barn. Patrick Spanton rode the 6-year-old to a share of the championship in the split first year green division.

Spanton found the horse in Alan Waldman’s sale barn in the Netherlands. “We went over and tried him, but Kelly bought him sight unseen,” he said. Spanton recommended that Straeter buy the young horse based on both his abilities and his temperament.

“He was a beautiful mover, and he had a big, scopey, lofty jump,” said Spanton, who assists Mary Gatti at Rainbow Canyon Ranch in southern California. Conditions the day Spanton tried Sin City were not the best. “It was freezing cold, indoor ring, and it was spooky,” Spanton said. “He seemed like he was going to be a quiet, agreeable horse, even in that environment. He’s just super quality.”

Freezing cold was one of the reasons Tracy Sully decided to relocate her horses to California. “I’ve had snow falling off my indoor arena for the last two months,” said the Alder Grove, B.C., amateur. She decided this year to keep the horses in Gilroy, Calif., where she will train with John French.

Not only does it never snow in Gilroy, but the little agricultural town is almost 1,000 miles closer to all the big California horse shows Sully usually attends. “The horses go back to Alder Grove during the winter to have a rest, but I just don’t want to haul them back and forth through the summer so many times,” Sully said.

Sully rode Elvis to the championship in the amateur-owner hunters, 36 and over division. She also took the blue in the amateur-owner hunter classic. Elvis was originally intended as a temporary replacement for Sully’s wonderful Choreography, but the Westphalian gelding has since become a capable champion in his own right. “I ended up buying him very quickly because Choreography had an injury, and I needed to get back in the ring,” Sully said. “He’s really stepped up and turned into a really nice horse.”

Jamee Crawford is another amateur who has recently relocated. Crawford grew up in Colorado Springs, Colo., but now finds herself in El Paso, Texas. It was a huge change, but Crawford, 20, has come to appreciate her new home. “I don’t really like the heat, but I love the people,” she said. “The people are what makes Texas great.”

Another change is the distance to her trainer. She rides now with Peter Pletcher, whose Houston-area barn is more than 700 miles from El Paso. “It’s a plane ride away–it’s too far to drive,” Crawford said. She still manages to get to Pletcher’s barn a couple of times a month and meets him at shows. This has kept her competitive with her lovely hunter Textbook, a horse she purchased from the Dennehys in Colorado.

“I was there when they imported him, and I fell in love with him,” Crawford said. “I rode him a couple of times and got along with him really well.” The pair continue to get along well; they earned the amateur-owner hunter, 18-35 championship in week 2 at Thermal.

Busy Days
Channay York of Delta, B.C., won the adult amateur hunter classic aboard her Westporte. Most young girls have to beg their parents for the chance to ride. In York’s case, it was her mother begging her to return to riding. York had ridden a great deal as a child but had then given up entirely for eight years.

Her mother, meanwhile, had a barnful of horses and nobody to work them. She was doing everything herself. All this changed when Westporte, whose barn name is Teddy, came into the family. “Teddy was like dangling a carrot under my nose,” said York. “He was so cute I had to ride him.”

That did the trick–York’s passion for riding was reignited, and her mom now has the help she needs to keep their 15 horses fighting trim. York, who works for the family’s insurance business, is glad to be back in the saddle. “It’s much more fun than going to the office,” she said.

Delanie Stone, of Encino, Calif., pulled off a hat trick in the pony ring. She took a catch-ride, Millbrook’s Tiny Bubbles, to the championship in the large ponies. She and Bubbles also won the pony hunter classic, and to cap her perfect week, Stone was named best pony rider by the judges.

“I love everything about this sport. Getting to be with the horses, and getting to win like today is a lot of fun,” said the 11-year-old Stone. Stone has the benefit of expert advice from no fewer than four trainers: Danielle Ackley, Peter Lombardo, Archie Cox and Teddi Jo Mellencamp. That Stone has time to ride at all in her busy life is remarkable. “I’m on school teams. I do soccer and basketball, and I’m trying out for volleyball,” she said.

Alison Baileys and her Tache Rouge topped the junior hunter classic, conquering a field of 50 in the process. “I found him with my trainer, Mary Morrison, in France last year when he was 5,” said Baileys, who also gets help from John French. “We brought him back here–well, first we gelded him–and now he’s my junior hunter.”

Baileys finds winning very gratifying, but even more pleasing to her is doing it with a young horse she found and brought along herself. “It’s really rewarding. It’s nice knowing that I personally went and found him,” said the San Juan Capistrano, Calif., teenager. “We made him what he is.”

Baileys will graduate from high-school in the spring, but will defer college while she finishes her last junior year. She’s already been accepted on full scholarship to Santa Clara University near San Jose, and might end up there. Whichever college she chooses will need to have a strong undergraduate science program, since she wants to pursue an equine veterinary career.

A Family Affair
Heidi and Nicole Kim share a passion for riding, and both did well in Thermal. Nicole was reserve champion in the amateur-owner hunters, 18-35 division with her Aspen, and finished third in the amateur-owner hunter classic. Her mom, Heidi, meanwhile, took her 7-year-old Brandenburg gelding Brooklyn to the championship in the adult amateur hunter, 36-45 division.

Both Kims train with Patrick Spanton and Mary Gatti at Rainbow Canyon Ranch. Heidi moved to Rainbow Canyon last year, not long after she’d purchased Brooklyn out of Europe sight unseen from a DVD. “Oh, by the way, I have a horse coming,” was one of the first things she told her new trainers. The horse looked wonderful on the DVD.

“He had all the stars in line,” Heidi said. Fortunately he was every bit as beautiful and well-mannered in person as he had appeared on the television screen. He’s so easy to ride that she is contemplating a move up to 3’6″ this year. “Before, that wasn’t even in the forecast,” Heidi said.