Three years ago, Canadian show jumper Erynn Ballard had a potentially career ending fall in the hunter ring. It left her with a broken collarbone, shoulder joint and shattered scapula—all but paralyzing her left arm. The damage was so severe, her orthopaedic surgeon strongly suggested she consider a career change.
Within a year, following months of painfully slow rehabilitation, Ballard was back in the tack. There was just one problem. She didn’t have a Grand Prix mount. She took a chance and approached fellow rider Keean White about a horse in his stable named Appy Cara.
“I called Keean and was like, ‘Sooooo, what are you doing with Appy while you’re at Spruce Meadows?” she laughs.
White agreed to give her the ride for a few weeks. It proved an instant match. Ballard and Appy Cara pulled in top 10 results in their first two FEI ranking classes together. In a year and a half that followed, the Toronto-based rider climbed some 3000 points up the world rankings to the #122 spot, earning a spot on the Canadian Nations Cup team in Mexico with Appy Cara.
Then, in December of last year, the horse that brought her back from the brink of retirement to the international stage was sold to Argentinian rider Ramiro Quintana.
What has Appy Cara meant to your career?
I didn’t have anything to do with the purchase of Appy. He wasn’t bought for me. The stars and the moon and everything aligned and I got the ride. That horse, for sure, changed my life. I got him after getting hurt. I existed nowhere in the world [rankings]. I didn’t know if I was ever going to be a jumper rider again. It was 10 years since [my former Grand Prix horse] Robin van Rossendael was at his best. It was a 10-year gap from when I rode on the team in Wellington and when I rode on the team in Mexico.
So, that’s a lot of years and a lot of horses that weren’t quite good enough and didn’t quite make it. Appy changed my life. Robin changed my life. Appy changed my life again. I owe basically the last two years of my success to that horse.
Did you consider making a bid for the Canadian Olympic team?
We had talked about it, obviously. But the Canadian team is very political and I had basically zero chance. Keean and I have a group of owners who are in it for the long run. To keep a horse that had zero chance of going to the Olympics wasn’t worth the risk. It’s a championship year. It’s a championship horse.
You were the fourth ranked rider in Canada when Appy was sold. Why do you say that you didn’t have a shot at the team?
In the last four-year cycle, the team that they’re planning to use for the Olympics has had a lot of success. They had success at the Nations Cup Final in Barcelona. They had success at the Pan American Games. They had maybe not so much success at the London Olympics, there was a bit of drama, but basically the last two years, between the 2014 World Equestrian Games and the 2015 Pan American Games, it’s been the same four riders.
We were told collectively, as a group of Canadian riders, “Why fix what’s not broken? Those four are our go-to team. And those are the ones we want to use.”
Maybe there’s one spot that’s available given horse-rider combinations, horses getting old, people not peaking when they need to peak. But for sure, Tiffany [Foster], Eric [Lamaze] and Yann [Candele’s] posts are spoken for. As long as Dixon [Ian Millar’s horse] is going the way he needs to go, his place is solid.
To go as a reserve rider to Brazil, you miss out on some opportunity at home. Not that you wouldn’t love to be named. But, at the same time, who’s to say if I was the reserve would I sign up to go? Or would you say, to be number five really isn’t worth it when there isn’t much of a chance to move up?
Still, it must have been tough to lose your top horse.
I had him for 17 months. I had an awesome run. I did cry for a week, for sure. I was hysterical. But I knew getting into it that it was a horse that was for sale.
Keean’s in this for the business—he would consider us business partners. I was there for Ramiro’s first trial. I prepared Appy in the morning. I did what I do with him. Then Ramiro asked for a 10-day trial with the horse to live in his own care. Through that process, he had me come over and lunge him one day.
I didn’t watch the second trial. Keean sent me the video, but I didn’t want to watch him. I did eventually. It’s sad, but it’s exciting. Keean has always said to me, “If he gets sold we’ll buy you new ones. You’ll get new horses, don’t worry about it.” And I did. I got two nine-year-olds this winter that are incredible.
A lot of horses change hands before an Olympic year. Did selling him feel like a “now or never” decision?
You have to take into consideration championship years and the age of the horse. Appy was 11. This year is the Olympics. Next year is an off year. If he didn’t get sold this year and you would consider him to be a championship horse, next year he’s 12. There’s no reason for anyone to buy him.
So then you are looking at selling him as a 13-year old, maybe it’s the wrong time. Now was the right time, the right age, with the right show record, with the right reputation.
And he gets to go to the Olympics! So for the owners, that’s cool. They owned a horse that went to the Olympics. For me, that’s cool. I got the ride a horse that’s going to the Olympics. And maybe in four years, it’s a different cycle. Maybe the Canadian team will be on different terms. If I have a horse then that looks like it could go to the Olympics, we can say to the investors, let’s keep this one and take a shot to go. But we knew this year we didn’t have a shot.
Okay, tell us about your new horses!
Keean and I had tried a few horses before Appy was sold. I wanted to buy just about all of them. But Keean would say, “No. This isn’t the right horse. I’ll tell you when we can buy the right horse.”
We ended up buying two nine-year-old mares—Z Diamante and Corette—from Javier Salvador in March. They both placed in the ranking classes at the end of the Winter circuit in Wellington and in Coapexpan, Mexico. So already at their level, I’ve been super competitive on them.
Z girl jumped so incredibly at the end of Wellington, in a way, I was like Appy who? Because now I have this one. You put your time and energy into what you have. I’m pretty good at liking just about every horse I ride.
I also have Sombero Brimbelles, who is owned by the Angelstone Partners.
They are really special horses. But they were bought by investors so, at some point, they are going to be sold. We’ve sort of based the proposal on 17 to 18 months. With the group Keean has, we have a lot to look forward to. And he promises me, if Z girl gets sold, he’ll replace her.
As long as I get to be in the ring and I get opportunity and, as a rider, I feel like my career is still moving forward, I’m not ever going to be upset.
I consider myself very lucky.