be eligible to compete there for two more years—but we’ll make a plan with my coaches at the beginning of the year and see if it works with the horses’ competition schedules. I had a great time and if the opportunity arises I don’t see a reason why I wouldn’t go back.” It was also his first time competing at Rebecca Farm in beautiful Kalispell, Montana with a dramatic mountain back- drop. “It’s a wonderful event; they do such a great job,” he continues. “It was a little bit surprising to me how many horses were there, and it was impressive how they kept everything running smoothly, a testament to their event.” There was also time for fun on the trip. “As a team we
went white water rafting and the guide told us about some bridges and cliffs we could jump off—though our coach made us wait until after the competition to try that! It was incredible,” he adds.
Training with the Best The Zuschlag family owns
roughly a 60-acre farm just 15 minutes from downtown Greenville, South Carolina and Will and his horses are based there for now. The family farm is only about 30 minutes away from the Tryon International Equestrian Center (TIEC), which will host the World Equestrian Games in 2018 and is home to numerous jumper and dressage shows as well as The Fork CIC3* and the American Eventing Championships. Will trains with David and
Karen O’Connor, who are based in Virginia and Florida, season- ally. In 2015 he worked with Marilyn Little for the month of January in Wellington, Florida. It was near the end of that year that he broke his ankle and was out for five and a half months. Unfortunately that left him out of most of the 2016 spring eventing season. “I had physical therapy and they allowed me to start
riding as soon as I got my cast off, but I didn’t have anyone at the time to keep my horses going, so it took time to get them fit and competing again,” he says. These days his girl- friend Rachel Wood, who is also an eventer, helps Will keep his horses going.
Talented Mounts Both of Will’s horses started out as competitive show jump-
ers. The gelding, RF Southern Command (called SoCo, aka 22 November/December 2017
Damiaan), is a KWPN by Ustinov out of Trijntje. He had competed as a straight show jumper, then was purchased by an adult amateur event rider who took him to the one-star level, then Will purchased him through Marilyn Little. “He did okay but he had some stops and time faults and
hadn’t done well in the dressage,” he recounts. “Marilyn actually wanted to make him an equitation horse, but then called me and said he was the perfect horse for me. That was summer 2015. I was actually on a family vacation and didn’t get to see him for a couple of weeks. He was a tough ride: he wouldn’t put his head down and is really hard in the mouth and heavy on the forehand, so he’s not fun to ride in the dres- sage. But no matter what you do, he won’t touch a rail in the show jumping.” Will’s grandmother also has
a small farm just ten minutes from TIEC, so it’s easy for him to stay at her place while he competes at jumper shows there as cross training for eventing. “He’s a great jumper and it’s a lot of fun,” he said. “And it’ll just make us even more prepared and competi- tive when it comes down to a clean round in the jumping. He’s a really cool guy.” Last summer Will’s family
Will and Southern Commander warming up just before cross- country at The Fork.
purchased the 2011 mare Go Happy, also a KWPN, by Canturano. She was also bred to be a jumper but didn’t quite make the cut to be an elite show jumper. “Sometimes she’s not as careful as the geld- ing but she’s much better on the flat. She’s always scoring 21-23 in the dressage. I don’t think we’ve had a score above a 25 until we did the modified where she got a 30.” Regarding the modified
format, which includes dres-
sage and show jumping at Preliminary level but cross coun- try at Training level, he says, “The modified was interesting. The dressage was in a small arena and the test tries to get so much done in a small arena everything came up fast. But it was fun and the level was good. Some people don’t like it; some people do. This mare just needed a really hard Training before she moved up to Prelim, but she was above the Train- ing—it was nice to have this in-between level. I’ve had other horses that wouldn’t need the modified, but it was good for her. She just turned six, so I’m not in a huge rush to push her.” As he heads into the fall of 2017 Will says, “The plan this fall is to take it kind of easy with SoCo, and I might take the
Amber Heintzberger
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