This weekend nearly every city—town—village—parish—hamlet—in America will stage an Independence Day parade. Bands marching, fireworks booming, politicians smirking, local celebs and beauty queens waving, towns people imbibing and of course, horses a-horsing....
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IlATnb8hT8o Horse shows can be stressful on amateurs. You know this. Your trainer knows this. Yet somehow the two of you are having a failure to communicate. She's explaining your course....
Horses have a reputation for making most things more complicated than they need to be, and it's not entirely undeserved. They come up unsound two days before the horse show....
Show horses have difficult jobs. Learning to live life on the road; working long hours in the cold, rain, or shine; standing still for the braider in the wee hours...
Anyone who has ever taken the time to search "Karl Cook" on Twitter (no, just me?) knows that the Internet is rife with photos of the Californian rider kissing his...
Is the world ready for a mainstream riding reality series? Viewers in the U.K. are deciding this month, where the five-part Blue Chip All-Star Academy series is airing on Sky Channel...
We're not sure when or how it happened that Leonardo DiCaprio became the poster boy for the funniest horse memes on the Internet. All we know is that he is....
When most people come into an unexpected windfall, they take a bit of that money and spend it on something frivolous. A dinner out at a fancy restaurant. A vacation...
He was there to pick you up after all those long, sweaty, summer days at the barn. He stared on with bemused bewilderment as you waxed poetic on the subtle...
The horse show… it can be exciting, nerve-wracking, exhilarating—and completely and utterly exhausting. Equestrians feel a range of different emotions leading up to and during horse shows. Here are the...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uMdFpGn3De8 "What am I speaking, Polish?!" This is what I remember my childhood trainer yelling at me when I failed to understand how to take my horse out onto the track during my...
Spontaneous outbursts of hyperactivity. General clumsiness. Messy eating habits. Inventing new ways to get filthy every single day. When you think about it, having a field full of ponies is...
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OVkXsENQg0c When you're a foal, every day is a new adventure. A change in turnout fields is a trip to the wild frontier, just ripe for exploration. Humans are strange, two-legged creatures that...
After making the mistake of telling my horse enthusiast colleague that I'd never ridden before, I found that I was suddenly taking part in a live streaming event to showcase...
It's a warm, sunny morning in June, which means there's a very good chance that "Pinto" the pony is off somewhere in a field, freaking out the neighbors. Pinto flat...
Maclay finals. One of the most prestigious and coveted equitation championships in the country. The prize is great. The stakes are high. And the horse show mothers are likely losing...
Once upon a time, you were a kid at summer pony camp. You took to it like a fish to water, and by the time the week was over, you...
“Oh, are you a jockey?” No, I just happen to be short and ride horses, but thanks for asking, I never get asked that question, ever. Life can be hard...
When you’re with the dudes, you’re just another dude. When you’re at the show, however, you’re the guy who can hang things and move things but can never find a...
There are plenty of people who would argue that no matter how beautiful you are, you can't get by on looks alone. You know the platitudes: beauty is only skin-deep,...
