October 27, 2022 
If amateur show jumper Lacey Gilbertson has a motto, it’s to keep her head down and her eyes trained on the task in front of her.
“I don’t like to go too far ahead,” says Gilbertson, 29, now in her second year riding for the Spy Coast Spies. “I’m definitely [all about going] one step at a time, and getting that done, and then moving on to the next [step].”
Fortunately for Gilbertson, these days, there are a lot more successes than setbacks. The American rider has so far competed at five of six Major League Show Jumping (MLSJ) legs for the Spy Coast Spies, helmed by her coach, Shane Sweetnam (IRL). But the big kicker? Gilbertson has jumped double-clear in all but one of them.
“I’m having a good year,” she says. “I have good horses, so they make my job easier.”
Good year, indeed. According to JUMPR App, Gilbertson has jumped clear rounds 41 percent of the time in her 2022 season, an improvement of nearly 10 percent on her 2021 performance. In fact, aboard current top horse, Karlin van’t Vennehof—who joined Gilbertson’s string this winter—she posts clear rounds 50 percent of the time, with six podium finishes this year alone.
“Last year was a little bit different. I didn’t quite have the string of horses that I have now,” Gilbertson explains.
“I just think, as I progressed as a rider, I’m more confident in my abilities and knowing I can execute a plan, and [getting] a result done when I need to.”
Growing up competing in the hunter divisions during in her junior years, Gilbertson says she eventually became disillusioned with the discipline’s subjectivity.
“In the hunters, everybody has a different style, and it’s so political. It’s [got to the point where, I thought], ‘I don’t want to do this anymore.’ It put me in a bad mood,” she says, adding that she decided to make the switch over to the jumper ring in her late teens. “In the jumpers, you know why you lost: you either had a rail down, or you weren’t fast enough.”
It was Gilbertson’s rider-friends Lindsey and Kaely Tomeu of Sweet Oak Farm that encouraged her to connect with Ali and Shane Sweetnam, the latter of whom ultimately became her coach. It was also Sweetnam that helped to set Gilbertson up with her self-declared “soulmate in horse form,” Baloppi.
Known as “Poppy” in the barn, the amateur rider credits the Danish Warmblood mare with giving her the skills she now depends on in MLSJ competition. “She’s the one that taught me how to be a winner and go fast,” says Gilbertson. “I think she’s probably the strongest partnership I’ve had with a horse.
“We both believed in each other, which is why she ended up jumping much bigger than I think [we] initially thought she was going to. Every time she stepped up, we’d be like, okay, she’s comfortable here. We can do it again and do it again.”
Poppy took Gilbertson up the ranks of the U25 Grand Prix division and beyond, earning multiple wins in Wellington, Florida, and in CSI3* and 5* competitions in Tyron, North Carolina. But the partnership wasn’t a slam dunk from the get-go.
“The first year, it was a little up and down. Sometimes I couldn’t turn, sometimes I’d get run away with, [or] she’d get all green and spooky. And then, I’d say about a year in, it just clicked,” says Gilbertson.
“Both of us just fully, 100-percent believed in each other, and when we went in the ring, I could make mistakes and she still would [be forgiving].
“She loves her job, and [if] we were somewhat close, she was going to jump clear,” she says, adding that, if nothing else, she could always rely on the mare’s incredible foot speed. “[That] definitely helped me build my confidence.”
Every partnership is a two-way street, however, and while Baloppi might have been willing to take a joke or two in the show ring, her rider learned to take a few out of it.
“She’s psychotic—fully psychotic,” laughs Gilbertson. “[Poppy is] rogue on the flat—probably the worst horse to flat in the barn.
“You just get run away with. She bolts. She spins. She bucks. Sometimes you can’t turn.
“She doesn’t like being told what to do, and that’s fine,” she continues, adding that she has no plans of ever letting the mare go. “It’s Poppy’s world, I just live in it.”
Though Gilbertson still competes Baloppi for fun in the 1.40m High-Amateur jumper division, the mare, who turns 16 this year, is currently enjoying her lower-pressure job—even as Gilbertson’s competitive star on the MLSJ scene keeps rising.
“Last year, I was the rookie rider, and there’s a little less pressure, because I was getting the experience,” she says, adding that, having never ridden in Nations Cup competition before, the stress of the team format took some getting used to. But it’s a feeling she’s learned to embrace.
“I think I ride better under pressure. I stay more concentrated,” says Gilbert, who—not unlike her favorite mare—describes herself as a “stubborn and determined” competitor. “Now [I think] they feel when they put me on the team, they know I can deliver [and] make a difference.”
Having found her niche, Gilbertson says she’s focused only on the tangibles in front of her: doing her best in the next round, on the next horse, at the next horse show. But she’s letting herself enjoy the process, too.
“You kind of have to be a bit addicted to [show jumping]. We lose way more than we win, statistically speaking,” she says. “Once you do win, you definitely [want to] keep chasing that feeling.”
