HERA “H


era is unassuming when you see her—a petite, plain bay mare. She’s also an incredible jewel in a very plain wrapper.”


That’s how Columbia, Missouri breeder and trainer


Cheryl Holekamp describes the mare that she and her husband Tim bred back in 1993. The Holekamps have bred and trained Trakehners at their New Spring Farm in Columbia for more than 20 years.


UNEXPECTED PLEASURE Hera was the result of an unplanned breeding using Havel, the mare their son had been riding, for insemination with Garibaldi (a Consul son) when the mare they planned to breed proved to have already ovulated. Even as an unhandled youngster, Cheryl says, Hera


was always cooperative. “We let our youngsters be somewhat wild for the first three years turned out in a big pasture,” she explains with a laugh. As a two year old, Hera cut her hock quite seriously and had to be brought to the barn for treatment. “She was,” Cheryl remembers, “quite simply an angel. It was as if she knew she needed help.” Like many of New Spring’s young horses, Cheryl started


Hera as an eventer. “Combined training is an excellent foundation for anything, for any other discipline,” Cheryl explains. It was also a discipline Hera took to happily and one at which she excelled, as her competitive successes would demonstrate. In 1998, now five years old, she took third at the


American Trakehner Association (ATA) dressage futurity with a median Training Level score of 70%. In the same year, she was year-end champion at First Level for the Columbia Dressage and Combined Training Association, USDF All Breeds Training Level Adult Amateur Champion and third in the USDF Horse of the Year competition at


22 November/December 2010


Training Level. In 2000, she was USCTA (now USEA) Area IV training level champion and also ATA training level year-end champion in eventing. Her successes clearly demonstrated both her potential and the soundness of her basic training. In addition, Hera produced a foal in 1997, sold to a young rider in Canada. Since Cheryl was not interested in moving past


Training Level in eventing, the pair stopped competing and Hera became a Pony Club mount of choice for both the Holekamp daughters. In fact, Emily Holekamp successfully rode her “A” level flatwork test on Hera. “This mare was a true family horse,” Cheryl boasts. Cheryl continued to train the youngsters that she and her husband were breeding, giving each the same foundation she had given Hera.


EMBRACING DRESSAGE As time marched on, however, Cheryl decided to fulfill a lifelong dream and focus her energy on dressage. “In


By Pat Payne


Some horses have unsuspected talent. Tis is the story of one such horse and how her dressage talent found the spotlight!


Cheryl and Hera eventing in 1999 at Longview Horse Trials at training


level. Photo by Gary Owens


A Jewel Uncovered


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