By Kim MacMillan I
n 2010 17-year-old Jamie Pestana of Livermore, California, and her gelding Winzalot, a.k.a. Winny,
NAJYRC medalist Jamie Pestana and Winzalot compete successfully a third time in four
were sitting on top of the standings at the Adequan FEI North American Junior Young Rider Championships (NAJYRC) with two gold medals in the Junior dressage divi- sion and the highest scores of the competition of either age division. The pair was at the top of their game. Less than a year later Winzalot was critically ill in a veterinary hospital fighting for his life. Championship medals had become a dis- tant memory for the pair.
2011 A Year of Surgeries and Setbacks In July 2011, just ten days before their departure for their second NAJYRC competition, Jamie’s plans quickly changed from packing for Kentucky to hoping that Winzalot would survive.
Her mother Nadine discovered Winzalot very sick in his
stall. “My mom called me at 9:00 p.m. and told me he was col- icking. He is usually pretty tough, but she could barely keep him up. And he wouldn’t touch food or water, which is very unusual for him,” recalls Jamie about that terrible night. “She happened to be at the barn late that night and it is so lucky that she was, because the vets said if we hadn’t found him within the hour, he would have died. The local vet gave him some Banamine and told us to take him to the vet hospital immediately.” The Pestanas loaded Winzalot and hurried to the Pioneer
Equine Veterinary Hospital in Oakdale, California, where they were met by Dr. Brad Jackman and his team. Winzalot, a Hanoverian gelding (by Wolkenstein II, out of Franzisca by Frappant, bred by Hans-Heiner Duescher, Germany), was seven years old at the time of the colic. He had been
18 November/December 2013
Winzalot, a nine-year-old Hanoverian gelding by Wolkenstein II, and Jamie Pestana performing their silver medal winning Young Rider freestyle at the 2013 Adequan FEI North American Junior Young Rider Championships a year and a half after Winny’s three colic surgeries.
years at this summer’s championships, but not without her horse battling serious health issues along the way.
purchased sight-unseen by the Pestanas from Catherine Haddad-Staller’s barn in Germany as a coming four-year-old with only a month under saddle on the recommendation of their long-time friend Dennis Callin. “We knew Dr. Jackson and the facility very well. They were aware that I was leaving for the NAJYRC soon, so they were doing everything they could to try to prevent surgery. Unfortunately Winny just
Sarah Miller/MacMillan Photography
Third Time’s
a Charm
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