June 19, 2023 
It could be argued that you have to be a bit of a masochist to pursue a career as a professional rider.
Between the gruelling hours, cost prohibitive barrier to entry, and fleeting victories, there are easier ways to carve out a living—and most are considerably less dangerous, not to mention defeating.
So it’s not uncommon for an equestrian athlete to experience moments of doubt along the journey that cause them to they question their life choices. Especially when the results and/or horses aren’t going in their favor.
Canadian dressage trainer Shelley Lawder of Delta, BC had such a moment in 2018.
“There are so many ups and downs in the sport and there are so many times that you think to yourself, why am I doing this? It makes no financial sense. This is so much work. And, you know, I was successful 20 years ago, and now I don’t feel successful. There’s a lot of ongoing challenges of every sort that you have to overcome,” shared Lawder.
Then she met Randi Nelson-Shipley, an amateur dressage rider in Tucson, Arizona dying of cancer.
“She came to ride with me [while I was teaching in Arizona] and had a horse that she wanted me to teach the flying changes,” said Lawder.
“Her last wish was that she would be able to ride tempi changes on this horse.”
The horse’s name was Liqueur. With Nelson-Shipley too weak to make the six hour and 420 mile journey to Lawder in Del Mar, CA, her friend, Anne Bowen of Tucson, AZ, stepped in to trailer the horse and help make that dying dream a reality.
“She was indeed flying along the diagonal, doing beautiful four tempis and three tempis at the very, very end,” said Lawder.
“It’s a very special story. She was an amazing woman and rode right until her last day. And so she was such a powerful inspiration to me as a dressage rider.”
Randi Nelson-Shipley passed away in September 2018.
If the story ended there, it would be a touching tribute to woman in love with horses and the connecting power of community. But Nelson-Shipley’s influence continues to reign prominently in dressage arenas to this day thanks to an introduction she made between Lawder and yet another woman.
Molly Brewer is an oncologist from Connecticut and a former dressage rider who used to ride with Nelson-Shipley. In her final days, Nelson-Shipley introduced Brewer and Lawder and gave them a clear directive: Brewer was to get back into horses and Lawder was to find her the right one.
And they did.
After Nelson-Shipley passed, Lawder and Brewer set out in search of a horse and almost immediately found Balancee, a Westphalian mare at Olympic coach Johann Hinnemann’s farm in California.
“She was the second horse that we tried and we fell in love with this incredible temperament. She’s just such an easygoing, easy to ride horse. She’s the most trainable horse I’ve ever encountered,” said Lawder.
Last week at Thunderbird Show Park’s Touch of Class Dressage Show, she and Balancee contested their second ever CDI. At just nine, it was a big ask of the mare and one that Lawder didn’t feel entirely prepared for when she tore a page from Nelson-Shipley’s playbook and seized the moment.
“This is such a unique and special opportunity for West Coast riders to have CDIs here on the West Coast,” she said.
“My goal was that we would go for the big upgrade, which is giving [Balancee] some mileage and experience in this kind of environment and with these great judges and for this overall CDI atmosphere and experience.”
Like Nelson-Shipley executing tempi changes that day five years ago, their efforts were well rewarded. Lawder and Balancee danced to a second place finish in the FEI Intermediate I CDI1* on Saturday and to the top of the leaderboard in the FEI Intermediate Freestyle CDI1* on Sunday with a floating freestyle set to a Nutcracker soundtrack.
“I think the ballet music might have won the [judges] over,” smiled Lawder, noting that the music choice was the owner’s.
“Molly Brewer loves ballet,” explained Lawder. “All her horses have ballet names. And so she said, ‘We must have ballet music, it must be Tchaikovsky.’
“So I had to acquiesce.”
Their dance-inspired freestyle earned a score of 72.850% from the judges. Randi Nelson-Shipley was not there to witness the moment, but it’s not hard to imagine she would have been moved—by the horse and the women continuing her legacy.
“With Randi, this is what she wanted to do on her last days on Earth. And so she was such a profound inspiration to Molly and I. And that’s what really seals our partnership.”
