scholarship. Campeon was the number one North American- bred horse and Milagro was number two. But they are not first in line [for the scholarship], so we’ll see.”
A Thriving Partnership The enterprise with Rose is mutually beneficial: Taryn had an upper-level mare her family bred and who progressed to the two-star level last spring; she’s at SE Farm now, bred to Clair de Lune SE. And, of course, Taryn has some wonderful young horses to ride and compete.
English Meets Western T
“It’s a really nice partnership. Rose is a great supporter and
big cheerleader and trusts me and my opinion,” Taryn says. “Taryn is a fantastic trainer. What I like is she’s really good in all three disciplines; she comes from a show jump- ing background and often that’s the weakest discipline for a lot of the eventers,” Rose responds. “Taryn is very, very strong in the show jumping and my horses were originally bred to be jumpers. Then I started breeding for eventing instead of show jumping, but they still have a lot of jumper bloodlines.”
aryn’s business partner Justin Pearce, 34, has been a big influence on her training philosophy. “Taking what
they use in the Western world has really changed how I work with the horses,” she says. “We’re working with a six-year-old now who had been untouched since he was a weanling. I’m going to start jumping him next.” Taryn and Justin moved their businesses to a new facility with an indoor arena in New Tripoli, Pennsylvania in Decem- ber. Partnering in their training, they use both English and Western methods to achieve results with the horses. “I rode with a couple of pretty cool guys who were awful
handy, Steve Metcalf, Doug Ingersoll and Corrie Cush- ings,” Justin says. “One of the things that I’ve noticed with the eventers and how they start horses is that a lot like the dressage horses, they just get them where they’re kind of rideable and kind of go with stuff. They often don’t really take the time to teach horses to break up all their parts, like their head and neck, shoulders and hindquarters, and get to where the horse can use those parts. Getting to where they know all their different pieces and can use them has been helping Taryn a lot.” Justin was a psychology major in college and says he applies his education to training horses. “Sometimes you’re able to figure out why you have a problem with a horse, like transitions, or getting really strong,” he explains. “Taryn would ride horses who would get strong and want to fight against her hand, and I’m working on getting them more rideable so you don’t have to spend as much energy trav- eling around a course. If you’re galloping around an eight- minute course constantly fighting, it’s pretty taxing on both of you. Also, you want the horses watching what’s in front of them and sizing up what they need to jump, so they can competently solve the immediate situation. The quality of the ride is a lot better when you can think about the impor- tant stuff, not just getting around.” He also says building confidence in the horses he works
with is important to him. He generally rides Taryn’s young horses for the first 60 days and then rides them as neces- sary. He says that while people often send horses to him for 30 days of training to get them started under saddle,
90 is really ideal because it takes time for new concepts to become solid, learned habits. “They have to believe in themselves and in their person.
Really the way to get that is through positive training,” he continues. “A lot of people focus on the negative, like when people are raising kids and discipline them for doing something wrong; people do the same with horses and get after them when they don’t like something, but they forget to reward the horse for doing some- thing right. Maybe a horse is having a bad day and struggling with some- thing in his training, like being soft through his body. I use positive rein- forcement when they get it right; when they mess up I’ll show them it’s not the right answer and try again, and reward them when they get it right.” “If you tell them some-
At the Rhodes Ranch Colt Start- ing Competition in Tuscarora, Nevada, Justin won first place when starting this wild four- year-old. This was his fourth hour working with the horse.
thing contradictory, that’s where they begin not to trust you. You have to keep things consistent. Also, if you get them into a bad situation, they’ll lose their trust in you,” Justin, whose background is in reining and cow horses, adds. He notes he has fun figuring horses out in partnership
with Taryn, breaking problems down to the “kindergar- ten” level. “Any horse we ride—dressage, cutting, event- ing, Saddlebreds, I don’t care what—does five things: goes forward, goes backward, goes left, goes right, and stops in the middle. Each piece is fundamental and everything can be broken down to those five things. Being able to say let’s take this back to something simple, you can figure out which of these five things is ‘broken’ and attack a problem a different way. And how cool is it when it works out?”
Warmbloods Today 31
Melissa Simpson
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