May 7, 2024
I recently had a phenomenal conversation with my very good friend Eliza about having this incomparable feeling of emotions we have had with our respective mares. She spent several years successfully riding and competing this incredible thoroughbred mare, Layla, that is my previous trainer Charlotte's long time ride. She and I talked about that feeling we've gotten when we are with these horses, both on the ground and in the saddle, and I would associate them with the term heart horse. Eliza similarly described her relationship with Layla as soulmates, which is something I have been feeling recently with one very special horse in my life.
Like many people who get involved with horses, I do consider a 'heart horse' to be a thing. I think it can look many different ways for many different people, and I do not think that it has to be restricted to only one horse over a person's lifetime. In my mind, the term 'heart horse' is used to describe a horse that touches your soul. I know it sounds so freaking cheesy to read that (it feels even more cheesy to type it out). I think many horses have the capability of doing that, which is why I don't think it is a term that should be restricted to only one horse during your life time. However, I don't think that every single horse you come across will draw the same emotions that a true heart horse will.
When I was younger, I would have easily said Cliffy was my heart horse. I had experiences with having favorite horses before him, but he was my first horse, our family's only horse, and the horse I had some of my most formative riding experiences on. He was safe, sane, naughty in funny ways, and overall just a great little horse. He loved people, loved his annual holiday molasses treats, loved cribbing, loved being groomed, and I would even go so far as to say he loved when my sister and I would cruise around on him for bareback rides as he inched closer to full retirement. I didn't get to spend nearly as much time with him as I would have liked in his last years, as I lived states away from him, but every time I would visit I would feel grounded by him - like a piece of me that was missing when I was away would be put back again. I still was riding and doing a lot of horse things down in CT, but he was something special and I will always hold him in my heart.
Before Cliffy, I was particularly enamored with one of my barn's lesson horses: Stella. Stella was my very first 'favorite' horse. Riders of all ages often end up falling in love with one horse over the rest in schooling programs - it is a common feeling shared amongst lesson riders. When I was teaching lessons, it was always one of my favorite things to ask, because there was often one or two horses that had huge fan clubs, but it was heart warming to hear the 'quirky' or 'more challenging' horses come through as an underdog choice for favorite lesson horse. Stella was my favorite until Cliffy came along. She was a petite, grey Welsh mare with interesting dark speckles down the right side of her neck and a black spot on her nose. She was known as the spooky lesson horse, and myself and my barn mates definitely have memories of falling off of her as she jumped sideways at the ghosts that made their home in the 'scary corner' of the ring, but I loved her regardless. I would describe my feeling as being obsession with her, and not really a true 'heart horse' relationship. I was so young that I don't think I had the ability to have those deeper emotions with her at that time regardless.
I even had favorite horses during my career as a member of IHSA at Fairfield. Our lesson program was a bit chaotic over the four years, as we jumped between several different host barns. During one of those years, I fell quickly in love with this one particular mare, Scarlett. She was this lovely bay mare that had very clearly been there and done that in the three rings in her life time. I was always delighted at the few times I would pull her for lessons, and I enjoyed the ride on her so much that I saved my pennies to go to a show with her outside of IHSA. She carried my butt around a local schooling hunter show in the 2', and we ended up bringing home the tricolor ribbon that day. I didn't ride her often, but I still definitely picked her as my favorite choice for lessons while we were stationed at the barn where she resided. She was definitely not close to a heart horse, but I did love the short time I spent riding her.
Favorite horse feelings followed me through my time at N&C in Connecticut. Charlotte and Alicia had an array of fabulous school horses, and I was afforded the opportunity to ride and work with so many of them, but one in particular caught my heart from the start: Winslow.
Winslow is this adorable, mostly black, paint quarter horse standing at around 15hh on a good day with a nearly bald face and one blue eye. He is a looker. He has face markings such that when you look at him, it's hard not to make stupid noises and talk at him like he's a baby because he is just so darn cute without trying - and he's in his late 20's!!
I started loving him after riding a few of the more challenging and technical horses in the program, and then stepping into the saddle on him felt like a breeze. He's a kick ride, but incredibly reliable, and super talented on the flat. He also holds a bit of an athlete in his round belly - he popped me over several 3'+ jumps even when we were cantering as slow as a turtle and I was providing him with questionable distances. He took me to my first two events back out since I was a kid, and at both he carried me around like a true seasoned professional.
I loved him even more as I started teaching lessons with him. He was so saintly for really tiny children, and knew when to bring the spice out for the slightly more knowledgeable kids and small adults. I had many lessons where we would turn a corner and he'd let out a cheeky buck or two and toss an unsuspecting rider to the ground, but never hard enough to cause damage. Just hard enough to knock their balance and teach them a lesson on sitting up!
Favorites continued when I was provided the opportunity to lease this beautiful, big, bay Hanoverian gelding, London. I had ridden him a few times here and there as a part of the lesson program, but with my skills increasing and my eagerness to compete returning, leasing became the best path for me to pursue. I would say that I liked London at first, but I wasn't head over heels. He was a grumpy man on the ground, and had a knack for stepping on unsuspecting toes on purpose. He was so talented and athletic, but lazy as all get out and made you work for every step.
After riding him for a few months, I grew quite fond of him. I could physically feel the improvement in my riding, and his disinterest in being a team player made our successful rides feel that much more so as a result. I ended up leasing him for two years, and by the end I truly loved him. He took me farther in my eventing career than I had ever gotten in the past at the time, and again every success on him felt so rewarding. He made me into a strong, determined event rider. He is a good, good boy that continues to teach riders how to be stronger and better from youngsters to experienced adults in N&C's lesson program. I will eventually develop a blog post dedicated entirely to this incredible horse at some point.
Tying back into my thoughts about heart horses, I would not consider Winslow or London to be heart horses for me. I had incredible experiences on them, and I love them both to death, but now having had a recent feeling of a horse touching my soul, I can't say that I had relationships with either of those good boys that got to that point. I will forever hold a special place in my heart for them, I get filled with joy whenever I get the chance to go and visit them, and I love that they continue to have people that love them like I did - and still do!!
Enter Sophie. If you were to ask me right now who my heart horse is, 'Sophie' would escape my lips without a second thought. I have loved many horses in my equestrian career so far, but the feeling I have when I ride that mare is something completely different from anything I have ever experienced.
Now I have to add a lot of context here before I circle back to the subject of this blog post in order to capture the experiences we have had as a duo that have led me to this deep emotional feeling I have with this horse.
I started loving Sophie the very first day I started seriously riding her. I had hacked her a few one off times in the several years that she had been present at N&C, but I had never jumped her or taken her cross country schooling until the summer of 2021 when I moved my lease from London to her. I still remember my first show jumping lesson so vividly. I had so much FUN. She was previously a jumper, and with her there was a feeling I hadn't had with several of my past horses - that feeling of a horse taking you to the jumps.
All my previous favorite horses had been true kick rides. Kick to the jumps, kick away from the jumps, kick around the turn - Sophie was still a real leg-on ride, and for sure a bit of a kick ride on the flat, but she was just as eager to get over the jumps as I was, particularly in show jumping.
Our first cross country schooling ride was a bit sticky, however. She liked the jumping, but she was definitely showing her green-ness. We had several run outs, stops, close calls - but I could still feel her trying. She made it clear she was uncertain in several places, but she would still often give an effort.
Our second xc schooling outing was still a bit sticky, but better. We had a few stops, but I was starting to figure out the ride.
Our first event was great. We ran around Town Hill Farm in 2021, a super fun Area 1 event. She took me through the novice show jumping with ease, and we both hopped around the novice cross country feeling pretty solid in our new partnership. It was the first cross country ride I had been through in a long time where it felt like the horse beneath me was trying to stay with me every step of the way.
We spent the first year together moving from the novice to the training level, and then working to become really solid at the training level of eventing. Charlotte is known for her super technical show jumping practice courses, and we schooled all sorts of things from crazy hard angling exercises, to single barrel jumps, to lines of skinny fences and corners - we did it all. And each ride I could feel both Sophie and I learning each other and working together to make it over each jump as a team.
I am tearing up as I am writing this next part about how well we know each other and then also our recent outing at the prelim level once again. At this point I can confidently say that Sophie and I know each other quite well. I have had the ride on her for close to three years, and we have literally been all over the east coast together now.
I am always prepared for her to feel tense as we enter the sandbox, and we continue to work on suppleness and strength at home to build confidence in that ring when we are away.
I know that she will be smart and confident about her choices in the show jumping and will ask me for the tight distances to upright verticals while asking us to leave out of stride to the oxers. I also know that she knows her striding better than I do and I need to do less to allow her to do more in places where I worry it might be sticky.
I know that she wants to do the job in the cross country, she is really liking it, and she trusts me that we can get over the jumps that I set her up for.
I have taught Sophie that I will always be there for her on the other side of each fence. I never want to sound like I am full of myself, but I am quite confident in my ability to keep my leg on, and Sophie has told me that she needs and likes that kind of support. Obviously I think most horses need and require that support, but I first really learned that skill with always having to ask London to keep going, and I have really fine tuned that skill while riding Sophie. I will add that it is never 100% perfect, but I try my hardest to make it as close to that as possible.
I think Sophie's willingness to try came to as head as we went schooling at Loch Moy before I went to Carolina a few weeks ago. Jacqui gave us an exercise that included a down bank and then a few strides to a skinny chevron on an indirect line. Sophie is growing in her confidence down drops, but often hits them with what I call the 'shuffle and slide' ride. She'll lower her body as we get close to the drop down, and scoot off with her shoulder usually going left. The exercise that Jacqui organized for us would require me to hold my eye on the skinny chevron and start riding it before we even made it off the bank. It was a focus exercise for me more than anything.
On our first attempt, Sophie did a real shuffle and I spent too much time thinking about how we could perfectly line up to the base of the chevron. I ended up not seeing a distance and pulled Sophie back too much for her to be able to take off, and she almost made the effort to just try to leap over it but ended up falling to her knees at the base of it. My heart broke for her because she was ready to be there for me and I left her hanging. We then turned around and attempted the ride again, and I stayed tall, supported with my leg and seat, didn't make a last minute decision and I let the jump come to us.
It rode perfectly.
And Sophie threw a great shape over it as a bonus.
But that moment put me in check to remember that Sophie has gained a lot of trust in me and confidence as a result of us having several good rides together, and I needed to trust her more to be the team player she is.
She always shows up.
I wrote details about our ride at Morven recently in my recap post, but I am going to repeat myself here because I think it is so important to describing that 'heart horse' feeling I get with her.
In the show jumping, I made a bad decision into a one stride combination, and Sophie bailed us out by making a massive effort to get us out and ended up breaking a rail as a result. But she is such a part of this team that she put in the work to make up for my mistake in that moment. I know that this horse knows her striding, and I need to do less, but I did too much and she still helped us get out of trouble.
And then out on cross country, because she still isn't as confident there as she is in the show jump ring, she didn't feel that she could bail us out like she had previously when I set us up for a very poor ride to a skinny early on. That was information I needed to feel, and then we headed over a massive trakehner where she and I started really clicking.
The rest of the ride was so good it was almost emotional for me.
We had challenging questions where I could feel our mutual trust in each other come to life as we navigated them. We even had a down bank to a corner that included a classic Sophie shuffle and slide, but I picked and held a line to the corner and she gave a massive effort to ride it out of stride. I had my leg on, but I definitely could have been stronger in my upper body as we landed and yet she continued on.
In places where I could feel her hesitate, like as we approached the sunken road, I simply supported with additional leg pushing her to my hand, and tried to relax my body to let her know it was going to be okay and I'd be there on the other side.
And then in places where I was either a bit too bold or a bit too tight, she could see the jump and knew what the task at hand was and put in her own good effort to bring us through. Like when we were winding down towards the end of the course and galloping down the last big hill towards a large table, I didn't steady in the spot where I should have and she smartly backed off slightly in the last stride to it in order to allow us both to land in a more balanced position on the other side.
I think that on a fundamental level horses spend their time thinking about their food and about their safety, and I definitely would not say that Sophie loves me, but I do absolutely believe that this horse trusts me and is just as much of a team player, if not more so sometimes, than I am. When we are on the ground together, she'll follow me to places I know she's not comfortable going - like in the trailer alone or walking close to a field of cows - because she has learned that it'll be alright on the other side if we are in it together. The same goes for when we are out on cross country: I can feel the tenseness in her body when she is unsure of a jump, but she still will put in the effort because I am there to support her and I haven't put her in a bad situation on the other side. She comes up to me from turnout, sometimes even at a gallop, because she has associated me with positive things, be it cookies or a good groom or a solid ride.
And on my end, I know she won't try anything dirty when we are jumping. She won't slide to a stop or duck out of a jump on purpose - if those things happen, there is always a good reason for it, often a mistake on my end. I know that she will try, even if it means putting in more effort than she needs to, to make things happen if she feels enough of my support. I also know that she won't try so hard in a way that would put us in imminent danger. I know that she'll tell me when she needs more from me or when I am doing too much.
Much like how one might feel about a family member, I feel a sense of peace when I am with her. If I had the option to take the reins of any horse in the world right now or Sophie's, I would choose Sophie's every time. I am at a place where we feel like two puzzle pieces that were fortunate enough to be placed next to each other and happened to work together perfectly. And that feeling of running through the beautiful fields tackling obstacles confidently as a team is a feeling like no other. When I think too much about how much she means to me, I can almost get emotional!! I would describe the feeling as akin to how anyone might feel towards a family pet - you love them to no end and even just the way they might look at you for one instance can make your entire week. And you would do absolutely anything for them.
To summarize, this is essentially a love letter to Sophie, my current heart horse. Not only have we traveled up through prelim together, a long time goal of mine, but she continues to teach me about what a true partnership with a horse feels like, which I believe is essential to the sport of eventing. I would wager a bet that most upper level riders feel some sort of connection with the horses they ride at the elite levels, because I think horse and rider need to understand each other inside and out to get to that point. And I know for a fact that us amateurs can (and do!) develop these feelings with our horses at the lower levels, too.
I would love to hear about your heart horse(s). Feel free to comment or message me with your stories!
K
Bonus pic: Me squeezing the life out of Eliza after she finished her first prelim with Layla ❤️
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