Seventeen-year-old Robin Yeager is looking forward to strutting her skills as a dressage rider when she represents the north central zone next month at the B.C. Summer Games in Abbotsford.
The horse she will be riding, Jazz Man, is old enough for the Geriatric Games, if there was such a thing. Horses live, on average, 25 to 30 years. At 28, Jazz Man is well into his 80s on the human scale of comparison.
He no longer has the flexibility horses one-third his age were showing Saturday in the riding arena at the North Central B.C. CADORA show-jumping dressage and hack show at the Exhibition Park Agriplex.
But it was obvious the red roan appaloosa graybeard still loves to perform. He's been trained to jump four-foot barriers and it was no problem for Jazz Man to clear fences a foot shorter when Yeager put him through the paces.
"It was better today, he was just in a better mood," said Yeager. "In his condition and how high he's jumping and everything, it's pretty rare to have a horse his age.
"I'm really excited about B.C. Games. We're going a few days early so he can see the arena and hopefully he'll be in a good mood when we compete."
Yeager has been riding Jazz Man for three years, ever since she started riding.
"What I like about this is it's different every day, depending on your mood or the horse's mood - it changes every day," said Yeager. "Sometimes you win and sometimes you lose. They're a 1,000-pound animal with a mind of their own and they can do what they want."
Jazz Man was introduced to dressage four years ago by his previous owner to ease the burden on his aging joints and has been a jumper most of his life. In his prime, he easily cleared four foot barriers but with Yeager on board she's only asking him to go over two-foot-three fences.
"He's really good as a jumper, sometimes he still thinks they're four-foot and jumps it how he wants to," said Yeager, who racked up first-, second-, third- and fifth-place finishes in jumping. "It scares me sometimes but I can feel when he's about to do it so I can get ready for it or I can slow him down.
"I'm pretty proud of how he did with our jumping. We've had a few bumpy stretches lately so he overcame those and we did really well. His owners before did a lot of competing and he's been to a lot of different places and he doesn't spook at things and that's a bit of an advantage. But he gets a bit stiff at times in dressage and my scores reflect that."
The Summer Games will be Yeager's last event before she leaves for Olds College in Alberta to start the veterinary technical assistant program. Jazz Man will go with her and she can board him right on campus and can ride him whenever she gets time.
Two other Prince George riders - Kate Carter and Kylie Erickson - made the Zone 8 dressage team for the Summer Games, while Shaylene Hawkins of Smithers will be on the Zone 7 (Northwest B.C.) team at the Games, July 21-24.
Carter and Tango, a 14-year-old thoroughbred, won Saturday's Division 1 freestyle dressage test. They also had a great weekend in the show-jumping arena, posting two first-place finishes and a fourth.
"He's really good in dressage, his previous owner did a lot of dressage with him so he really knows how to do it, said Carter. "He's really good on the jumps."
Zone 8 won't be sending any show-jumpers to Abbotsford, where the bar will be set at three-foot-six. None of the local jumpers eligible for the Summer Games are jumping that high. Carter stuck to two-foot-six and two-foot-nine fences.
"I would like to go higher," said Carter, now in her sixth year of dressage. "We haven't jumped a lot this winter, working towards Summer Games (focused more on dressage). I'm liking them both; jumping is super-fun, it's so exciting, and dressage is exciting in its own way.
"Even if I come last at Summer Games I know I'm obviously going to come back a better rider."
The 15-year-old Erickson has been riding since she was four. She and Jordan, her nine-year-old equestrian partner, have been dividing training time equally between dressage and jumping. Erickson reached the three-foot level with her horse and knows he's got a lot of untapped vertical in him.
"I prefer the jumping - I love the jumping," Erickson said. "I have to use different bits so I have more control over him. He's new to me, I just started riding him in October. I want to go higher and I think he does too, he loves to jump. He just doesn't care if he knocks the rails over.
"He was very responsive to me (in the freestyle test) and our circles felt good. I find that sometimes he's a bit strong for me and he tries to pull and it's a bit of a struggle to hold him back, but for the most part he's good. "
Hawkins, 17, is in her fourth year of English riding, after two years of learning the ropes in reining, and she was happy with her weekend, riding Shikita, an 11-year-old Dutch warmblood. Hawkins was the runner-up to Carter in the freestyle dressage, followed by Erickson and Yeager.
