In The Irons

What makes one horse worth more than another? I think a number of things can factor into the answer to that question. First, we have simplicity — how easy the horse is to ride. Secondly we have ability — what divisions the horse is suitable for. Is it an open jumper or a children’s hunter? Then there’s soundness, and, lastly, conformation and beauty.

We have all heard people say how one horse is super easy to ride while another is harder to handle. Easy horses make riders look good — they are willing, smart and able. Easy horses do perfect lead changes, are quiet and even tempered, and seem to love their jobs. Difficult horses are sometimes too hot or sometimes too dull; they sometimes have difficult lead changes, are pissy and look like they do not want to be ridden. The easy horses are more valuable, because more people can ride them, and thus there are more buyers. Difficult horses rarely give their owners much joy and are less desirable; nobody wants them. Easy horses cost more to purchase, while difficult horses are cheaper.

Our second characteristic of a valuable or  an inexpensive horse comes with an animal’s God-given ability. What divisions can he do? Obviously, a children’s jumper will be less valuable than an open jumper, but a top-of-the-line lower level horse could possibly be the same price as a mediocre Grand Prix horse.  So, it’s more about what a particular horse can do and how well he can do it; a winner in any division is more valuable. A top big division horse will be more valuable than a top small division horse.

Soundness is a big issue. Veterinarians have more say in deals getting done and not getting done than all the trainers in the country combined. If a horse has a soundness issue, their price takes a hit; even if that soundness issue hasn’t been a problem yet, but might be, the price lowers. Clean X-rays sell. Bad X-rays lower prices. If you find a great horse with bad X-rays, you might have found a bargain. Some of my best horse deals have come after an animal has flunked the vet check!

Lastly comes conformation and beauty. While conformation can factor into a horse’s ability and soundness and greatly determine a horse’s value, so can cosmetic beauty. If a beautiful horse is of equal ability and soundness to an ugly horse, the beautiful horse is more valuable.

The most valuable horses are easy to ride, have the most ability, and are sound and beautiful. Sound simple? They are very hard to find, they are rare, and they are expensive.

There are various differences between teaching adults to ride and teaching juniors.

1. Juniors bounce when they fall, adults tend to break. For obvious reasons, when a kid takes a tumble it isn’t as alarming as when an adult has a dramatic spill.

2. Adults analyze everything , while juniors just do it. Adults like to discuss stuff like, ” Why was he bulging at the roll top, my leg was on him, he shouldn’t do that,” and “why does this horse keep chipping?”

3. Juniors remember their courses better. Adults remember their mistakes.

4. Adults invite an entourage when they show, juniors  have their parents.

5. Trainers clap for crappier trips when teaching adults, juniors get less benefit from doubt.

6. Adults know how much the show is costing them. Juniors haven’t a clue.

7. Adult horses must be quiet and fancy, while a junior’s needs to be fancy and eventually quiet.

8. Adults tend to remain in the same division they started in, juniors tend to move up divisions or go off to college.

9. Juniors warm up for classes very quickly, adults take forever.

10. If a young equestrian rides amazing during their junior years and takes a few years off for a ‘ normal life,’ they return as adult riders with all the attributes  that come with the territory.

My blog has been quiet for several months as Castlewood Farm, Inc. competed at the 2013 Winter Equestrian Festival in Wellington. It was not that I didn’t have plenty to say, but moreso that i was too tired to say it.

WEF is a grueling 12-week contest where some 5,000 horses compete in every type  of hunter, jumper, and equitation class that exists, and the pace is relentless. Everything from World Cup show-jumping to short stirrup equitation happens here, and my barn takes part in almost every aspect of the show. We really do teach from beginner to Grand Prix and everything in between; it is not unusual for our trainers to run from the low children’s hunters, to the $100,000 Fidelty Grand Prix in a matter of minutes. We love it, and I wouldn’t have it any other way, but it certainly takes its toll.

A typical day starts off very early during the circuit. Usually, we have hunters going, so those horses need to get into the ring and at least smell the jumps. That task begins as soon as the sun comes up, and we usually have a handful of our riders up and hacking. Our grooms start almost at dawn, and i’m amazed how dedicated these guys are. They tack the horses and send them on their way, while at the same time tending to regular barn chores like mucking, tack cleaning, and grooming the next horse. Castlewood rotates about 30 horses all season long from our main barn down the street. This keep our horses fresh and happy (as they get to have paddock time and a week away from the show if need be). We don’t, however, rotate the staff. I wish we could. Our grooms, riders, and trainers work every week, every day.

Wednesday through Friday we dodge through the schedule of hunter and jumper classes. On Friday the big equitation begins, and that in itself  is a mini-marathon, and on that day the USEF  Talent Search and the Washington jumper & hunter phases take center stage and go all day long.

Saturday nights are amazing. The big classes begin at sundown and feature the best of the best. We were fortunate to have a few of riders compete in these mega-events and do very well. Liza Finsness, aboard her Ormsby Hill, was the star of our barn this season, knocking heads and holding her own with the likes of Rodrigo Pessoa, Mclain Ward and Ben Maher. It was awesome, but these Grand Prix’s would linger deep into the night. Sometimes our grooms would be caring for these late entries up until midnight.

Which leads into Sunday morning: big equitation — 3 sections of the USEF medal, 3 sections of the Maclay. Then there’s the junior jumper classics — low, medium, and high sections (all three event are in different arenas, but the course walks always go, seemingly, at the same time), and, of course, their counterparts — the amateur-owner jumper classics, low, medium, and high. Children Jumpers, Modified jumpers, Palm Beach Adult Medal, THIS Medal, lead line, 1.50 classic, children’s hunters, adult hunters with three different age groups……ahhhhhhh. We sometimes pull our hair out.

Mondays are always welcome, but I found it hard to start writing this blog, even during those recovering moments. Each week was the same, again and again, twelve weeks straight. Put one foot in front of the other and keep moving…until you eventually complete the marathon that is WEF.

Like a baseball team, I try to build contenders. I try to build contenders from the hands (riders and horses) I am dealt. The kids and adults come to me with goals and aspirations, and I attempt to coach them into successful horsemen and hopefully winners. This is the daily challenge of my job that I love the most. Every day I try to better my team.

Very often I choose to have my young prospects start in the equitation. The big equitation is a huge  challenge and boasts the biggest talent pool of riders anywhere in the world. A talented equitation rider who can conquer the big finals pressures and courses can very often translate into the professional ranks with great success. The Medal, Maclay, Washington and Talent Search finals are great predictors of this success. If you can make a dent in those classes, chances are you have what it takes to make it as a pro.

Equitation, however, is not the only path toward success. Great child/adult jumper riders can turn into solid junior jumper riders and eventually Grand Prix jocks. It’s a bit more difficult to generate the “pressure” of the Big Eq finals in these divisions, but cool customers are cool customers, no matter how they got to be great. Laura Kraut, for example, did compete in the equitation divisions but was by no means an equitation star, yet I would challenge anyone to deny her the “star” status now, and no one is cooler under pressure than she. Laura was mainly a hunter rider until her twenties. The greats will always find a way to rise to the top.

Laura Kraut worked hard her entire career, braiding, mucking stalls, and riding every horse imaginable. Becoming a contender takes hard work and only those riders with the willingness to sacrifice a normal teen life and dedicate their lives to this sport seem to make it into the pro ranks. I’m not saying that an occasional late bloomer can’t spring into the professional ranks, but I doubt it happens without a great deal of blood, sweat, and tears. I look for the kids and adults that want to ride exceptionally more than anything else in the world. It is this trait more than any other that helps build a contender.

I also like to give the unknown riders a shot. Jacob Pope seemed to come out of nowhere to win both the USEF Talent Search Finals East and the ASPCA Maclay National Championship from virtual obscurity. He earned his shot by gaining attention in the newly created Emerging Athletes Program (EAP). Andre Dignelli took over as coach, and the boy made the best of his opportunity.

Like Pope, I gave some working students a chance at proving themselves as riders. I have found this to be one of the most rewarding aspects of my time as a trainer and coach. I have built contenders out of raw talent that I spotted at the horse shows — the kids that had the ability but little money, the kids who would work hard to get what they wanted. Among my working students were Jason McArdle , Michael Delfiandra, and  my current “work in progress” Morgane Qualls. All of these riders shared the do-what-it-takes attitude to make it in the horse world.

The other necessary ingredients are the horses. Good riders are only great when the horses they pilot are great. I guarantee there are hundreds of ” would-be” Grand Prix stars out there that would be famous if only they could get their hands on a solid horse. This search, in itself, is a life long commitment. Sometimes only one shows up in a lifetime, and sometimes a rider has the “knack” or the finances behind them to keep finding quality mounts. Building a contender requires a steady stream of quality horses. I look at new horses virtually every day of my life. I’m either on the phone talking about new horses, watching videos, traveling to Europe, or just plain watching at the show ring. It never stops. The search is an ongoing process.

The quest for contenders, both human and equine, is endless. If you know any of these diamonds in the rough, give me a call. We might just be able to help.

It was 1982, and I was 17 years old. I was one of the kids that could win the finals — one of the riders people threw out as a possible winner of the biggest equitation class on earth and quite possibly the single biggest class a junior rider could win. I was number 71 and riding my leased mare, Nightlife.

Buzzy, as we affectionately called her, was also my junior hunter and had won a class earlier in the week in Harrisburg. She had also been my USET Talent Search mount, where we had earned a finals ribbon (We were 9th). I’m not sure how this small horse kept going class after class, but she did, and I never expected any less. If she wasn’t sound for a class or two, I definitely wasn’t aware of it. She was always ready, always available.

Mason Phelps and Arthur Hawkins were the judges for the 1982 AHSA Medal Finals (now the USEF Medal finals), and they had designed a very difficult first round course for the 260 plus competitors (The finals always had big numbers in the 80′s).  I watched the first 50 competitors go and realized that this was no joke; the course was a handful. I listened to the first standby, noted a couple of names of friends that I had recognized, and then I went to get on my mount.

The schooling area was outside in what now is home for Bevals, the show office, and the food court. We didn’t have the luxury of the new indoor warm up ring. If it was raining, you got wet. Luckily, on that day the weather was great.

As I’ve mentioned in previous blogs, my trainers were Bill Cooney and Frank Madden. George Morris was the head honcho, but he remained in the stands by that point and only talked to us after our rounds. We went over our strategy and then entered the arena (which hasn’t changed very much in the years following, I might add).

We entered the ring and put in the trip of our lives. We were awesome!  The  sound of Bill and Frank’s whoops resounded throughout the Pennsylvania Farm Show complex. I remember the feeling even now. Bill said to me later, “If ever there was a (score of) 100, that was it!”

So up to that point it was the best day of my life.

The second standby list came about an hour and a half later. I was on top after the first 100 had gone, and I would remain in that spot throughout the entire first round. Notable riders that also made the stand by were future stars, including Peter Wylde, Greg Best, Louie Jacobs, Karen Mckelvy, James Benedetto, and Scott Stewart.

I sat in the stands watching for hours (in hindsight, I wish I had taken a nap). I listened to every standby and grew more excited with each passing moment. People were congratulating me on my performance and I was on top of the world. It seemed like the class went on forever. I was having fun…

…but suddenly the first round was over and it was time to walk the second round. They had called back 30 riders, so it wasn’t like I had been rushed. It was almost as if  I was in shock that I would have to pull off another stellar round. I hadn’t psyched myself up for this. It was new territory; I had never been on top in a finals before! I guess I was nervous.

The second round was also a very difficult test, but it was not the course that was my undoing; it was my mind. I remember entering the ring for the last round, hearing the voice of famed announcer Peter Doubleday saying my name and reminding everybody that I was the last to go, and additional testing would follow. What I remember most was how quiet the place was! The phrase, “You could have heard a pin drop,” was never more true.

I started the course and was handling everything quite smoothly until my foot slid up in my stirrup a bit and I thought for a moment that I may lose it. The stirrup problem turned into a lapse in my concentration, and all of a sudden, I lost my way.

I went hot. I never felt so hot in my life. I went off course, lost my way, and jumped the wrong fence. In fact, it was a triple combination, and I jumped it backwards.

The crowd let out a collective moan, and somehow I made my way out, completely destroyed.

So far, it had been the worst moment in my life.

I ended up watching the award ceremony from the stands. I sat with my trainers and received condolence calls from my friends and fellow equitation riders. It was very hard to hold it together with my sisters and parents. I watched as my good friend Sandy Nielson won the finals, and Louie Jacobs, now father of Charlotte Jacobs, came in second. Sandy was trained by Nimrod farm and Timmy Keys, while Louie was trained by Geoff Teall. Don Stewart, who trained the 2012 USEF Medal Finals winner, Meg Omara, was at my finals with students as well, probably developing the jokes he would crack for another 3 decades.

In the years that followed, I never spoke much about that finals unless a friend (usually Jimmy Torano) brought it up. Only a few people have ever seen the video tape of those rounds, partly because I really don’t love reliving that moment and partly because it probably wouldn’t look as impressive as I or my contemporaries remember. Taken out of context, without the other 250-plus exhibitors taking a shot at that course, it looks normal, even commonplace. To everyone that was there, who was a part of that final, knows it was special. I struggle with the possibility of transferring the old video onto YouTube, though my students have begged to see it over the years.

Flash forward to 2012 — 30 years later — and I am now a veteran trainer of many finals.

Geoff Teall judged the final.

Louie Jacobs is a nervous father of one of the top kids.

Timmy Keys and Frank Madden are still on top as coaches.

Don Stewart is still as funny as ever.

Peter Wylde and Greg Best are Olympic medalists.

Scott Stewart is one of best hunter professionals, and he co-trains Tori Colvin, along with Ken Berkley and North Run.

Sandy Nielson lives a completely different life outside the horse world…

…and one of my riders, Liza Finsness, sat in tenth place after the first round of the USEF Medal finals.

Liza and I walked the second round with a calmness we didn’t quite expect. Last year Liza was called back 7th and we were both far more stressed. This year the course looked  extremely favorable for her horse Fedelio, and that helped us relax.

We went over our strategy, and Liza executed the plan to near perfection. She finished in ninth place.

As the equitation ribbon recipients and their trainers were  asked to come into the ring, I couldn’t help but relive so many memories of the class I had come to know so well. I competed in this very class, in this very ring, and it all eerily felt very much the same. The final was hard to win then, and it is hard to win now. Some of the competitors in the 2012 event will go on to earn Olympic medals, others will become our top hunter riders, others will become top trainers, and still others will live completely outside the horse show world. Some will become parents and watch nervously from the sidelines as their children compete someday.

I watched contently as Liza received her ribbon. I’m proud of her and all her hard work. She has accomplished a great deal in this sport. I’m not sure what lies in her future, but no matter what, she will have this and other special memories.

Perhaps in 30 years she will tell her children about this final and about her trainer who went off course in his last final as a junior rider but kept coming back as a trainer, year after year. She will say that his persistence paid off, and eventually, he got to stand out in the  Pennsylvania National Horse Show arena and got that long-awaited ribbon. Finally.

18-year-old Rocketman readies for exercise on the treadmill.

I’ve had some interesting dinner conversations with my fellow professionals about extra exercise for our horses, more specifically whether to use a treadmill or a walker. The general consensus has come back in favor of the treadmill.

Most of my friends, myself included, prefer the treadmill over a more traditional walker, for a few important reasons. The first is the footing, and the second is safety.

While a walker is great exercise,  the footing is often times inconsistent below our horses’ feet.  I prefer the treadmill for the consistency it provides my horses. The footing never needs to be dragged or watered, and it doesn’t get dusty or deep. In fact, the footing is always perfect, firm, and rut free.

As far as safety for the animals, I believe a horse has less of a chance of injuring himself on the enclosed machine than while using a more traditional “walker.” On the treadmill, there is a learning curve, and a great deal of the horses need to adjust to the foreign piece of machinery, but I must say that very few horses don’t get the hang of it pretty quickly. Once they make the adjustment, horses usually work on it day in and day out without incident.

Traditional walkers have inconsistent footing that needs constant attention. The horses also have a lot of freedom that allows for bucking and playing. I feel this increases the chances for injury.

Recently, during Tropical Storm Isaac, which completely flooded the Wellington area, I was able to get my horses worked even though we were  surrounded by two feet of water. One by one, we groomed each horse and put them on the treadmill for twenty minute cycles. It took quite a while, because we have some thirty-odd horses, but the majority of them got out.

The treadmill also saves space: It has a relatively small footprint in comparison to a walker. A treadmill takes up about fifteen to twenty square feet, while a walker consumes about sixty.

My older horses seem to have benefited the most since I purchased a treadmill. I currently have two 18-year-old Grand Prix horses back in the show ring that were previously diagnosed with career-ending soft tissue injuries. Daily work on the machine before we ride them seems to have awakened the fountain of youth in them and given them the second wind their bodies needed to compete again.

As the new indoor season creeps up on us again, I can’t help but think about how many Medal and Maclay finals I have attended. It has been a great many, and I have gone through the process first as a rider, then as a spectator, and finally as a trainer.

As a rider, I rode with the best anyone could ask for: first with Holly Hugo Vidal and then then the legendary Hunterdon (which included George Morris, Bill Cooney and Frank Madden). These were some of the best times of my life, and I will always remember these finals like they were yesterday. I can probably recall in almost verbatim what these horsemen told me before entering the ring at each final, and I have passed these words of wisdom on to all my own students.

In my first final, I rode Robin Bacon’s “Training Wheels,” and in my last final I rode Ruthaan Bowers’ “Nightlife.” These horses will always have a special place in my heart, as do the other great horses that my sister Alyssa rode and the many others my students piloted. The list has grown into the hundreds now, and I doubt I could remember them all clearly, but what I can say is that on any given day a person or former student will jog my memory and take me back in time, and then I can remember:

“Oh yeah,” I will say. “I remember him! He was spooky as crap,” or, “Didn’t he stop at fence one?” or sometimes, “That horse was perfect!”

As a spectator – and brother – I watched my sister contest the finals. She rode with Beacon Hill when Bill and Frank branched out on their own and Stacia Madden was still Stacia Klein and hadn’t won a finals yet. That experience was almost harder to handle than my own junior career. I wanted my sister to win at least as much as I had wanted to win myself.

Now, as a trainer, I still want to win. I just happen to be able to do it year after year. With myself and later my sister, we only had about three or four chances at each of the major finals, and then we aged out.  As a trainer, I am able to rekindle my junior years over and over again with each new student I train. Every new student has his or her junior shelf life, and we plan and train accordingly, with the big finals usually as a major goal. I have gone through many, many, junior careers with my students now, and I have a future group  waiting in the wings (One could be my own son, perhaps. See: Flesh and Blood).

So, my finals career is seemingly endless. I compete in the finals year after year with different students, new horses, and new families. I can’t help but feel like a vampire or  maybe Ponce de Leon, who never ages and gets to keep playing the game. I’m not alone though; I have my fellow trainers that have been around even longer than I. We share the same arena, and while the students are different, we are the same. Each new final brings with it new possibilities, new results, another winner, and keeps me, forever young.

Each year, as the summer winds down and the new school year approaches, we find ourselves moving back towards our hometown. This year, however, when we arrived back in Wellington we were accompanied by an unwanted guest, and he came in the form of a tropical storm, named Issac.

Issac was a big, wet storm: not yet a hurricane, but doing his best to become one. The cone of uncertainty, given out by the weathermen, predicted the squall would bypass Wellington, but as weathermen usually are, they were wrong.

The wind velocity was not bad at all in our town. In fact, we did not get much more than a stiff breeze. But what we did get, was rain. Tons of rain. Record breaking rain that flooded our barn, shut off our power, closed our schools, and left us unable to ride for quite a few days.

Our main barn fared very well, remaining high and dry, but our outside “condo,” stalls weren’t as lucky. Twenty inches of rain accumulates rather quickly, and before you could say, “We  are getting wet,”  we needed to evacuate 8 horses and move them to the show grounds where we were planning to show in a few days. Thankfully, ESP and David Burton, Jr. accommodated our early arrival, and all of our horses were safe and dry again.

The rain lasted for two solid days, and Wellington looked like a disaster area. We were officially flooded at the barn and were amazed at how under water we were. Our RV looked like a boat on a river, our paddocks looked like ponds, and our parking lot produced waves that lapped up onto the shore that was the entrance to our barn aisle. Cars that braved the elements and  dared to venture up our driveway produced a wake that rivaled those of speeding boats in the intracoastal waterway.

So, when the rain finally stopped, we were left with a hefty clean up job. Not only were we soggy, but fish had managed to swim up to our stalls and die in our aisles (You can imagine the lovely smell those critters produced!). Our jumps floated away, our  cars stalled, and our horses became fresh.

After a few days passed, the area was once again rideable. The horses, however, were not so rideable: They were out of their minds! Some needed lunging, others tranquilizer, but all needed their exercise. Our riders were happy to get back to work after so many rain days, we were glad Issac left town, and now things can get back to normal.

We hear it all the time: ”The Grand Prix doesn’t look big. I could have done that class,” or,  ”Look how many went clean. That’s too easy!” We heard it again during the first round of the Olympics: “Everyone is going clean! Why is it so easy?”

It wasn’t easy. It was the first of a five-round battle for the Gold Medal, and the course designer built a nice track to start things off.  As it turned out in the end, only one person jumped five clean rounds. Was that easy? No.

Our best here in the United States went to London in hopes of winning a gold medal and came home empty handed. They were our best shot, they did their best, and I don’t think any other team we may have sent this year would have done better. It’s very easy to second guess decisions after the fact and say we “should have, could have, or would have….”  We had a grueling Olympic Trials, and out of that came the five best choices for this year’s games. If anyone was going to do better, they would have showed it at the Trials.

Yes, one could make an argument for some close contenders at the Trials, but we can only send five riders, and our selection committee did  their best and chose well. The USA has a very deep selection of riders; we probably could have fielded six great teams.

I fully expected our team to win. I thought we would get at least two individual medals and tear them up. It didn’t happen, but no matter what, it wasn’t easy, and the only people who may have thought it looked that way weren’t in it.

So next time a Grand Prix looks easy, make sure you are entered, because the easiest class to win is the one you aren’t in and doesn’t look big.

From Traverse City, we traveled to Kentucky to represent Zone 4 in the 2012 North American Junior and Young Riders Championships (NAJYRC). If you are not familiar with this event, it is basically the biggest jumping class a rider under the age of 21 can compete in, other than a regular Grand Prix. It attracts the best junior/AO riders in the country, and the trainers come from all around the U.S., (Missy Clark Brennan, Karen Healey, Frank Madden, Jeffrey Welles, Andre Dignelli, and Ralph Caristo are among the elite that attend) sometimes with a fraction of the riders they normally bring to the shows. It’s kind of like the USEF Talent Search Finals on steroids, and the winners are very often future Grand Prix and Olympic stars. Charlie Jayne and Reed Kessler are just two of the recent graduates that are now representing the United States at the London Olympic Games this year.

We were confident, for we were returning as the defending team champs, but few of our teammates from last year had returned with us to defend our title. We had no idea what lay before us, and our teams were quite young, but everyone was happy to be qualified again. Win or lose, we were all excited to compete.

That being said, our team really was quite good, and we had to be considered among the favorites. Along with Castlewood’s own Liza Finsness and Ormsby Hill, we had Michael Hughes, Michael Murphy, and Hasbrouck Donavan. All of these kids are top notch competitors with credentials up the wazoo. A repeat team gold medal was a definite possibility.

The competition, however, was also a confident bunch, and reclaiming the top prize would prove to be a difficult task. Not only did the other Zone teams look strong, but our fortitude would be tested by a number of challenging circumstances.

Our first such obstacle came during the team jog, where official veterinarians check all of the competing horses for soundness. Michael Murphy’s horse had competed hard all summer and came out a little stiff during the jog. The veterinarian chose to hold him out and check him the following day. A medication mistake later that evening led to Murphy’s horse being disqualified, and suddenly Zone 4 was down to three riders on the Young Rider team and no room for error. No longer would we have a drop score in the Nations Cup-like event. Defending the title got a little more difficult.

The first individual event was set to begin Wednesday afternoon and would set the tone for the rest of the competition. The first few riders managed to sneak their trips in before a huge storm settled in and forced management to postpone the event. The championship took on a gloomy feel even before our first horse set foot in the competition arena. Somehow Zone 4 would have to find a way to brush off the bad vibes quickly or watch a different team take gold.

Sadly, it was not to be a good class for our zone. While Hasbrouck Donavan did quite well, both Michael Hughes and Liza Fimsness had unfortunate rounds that dropped them out of individual medal contention – and ultimately team contention as well. While Liza wanted to continue and conquer the team classes, Michael’ s horse was too shaky to continue, and our team was done. Our hopes of repeat gold were lost.

Luckily, our junior team held it together, and Zone 4 made a valiant charge to earn the team bronze medal. I trained Claudia Billups for the event, and she and her teammates rallied in the second round to sneak back into contention when all seemed bleak.

After all was said and done, our crew packed up and headed south to where our barn mates had already set up shop at a familiar place: Fox Lea Farm.