Horses That Changed Me Case Study: Nicolosi

I was sitting on a tack trunk in the narrow, dim tent aisle at HITS Ocala.  I was staring at my phone watching a blurry video of a plain dark bay horse.  The horse was jumping around a 1.20m jumper course in a small indoor in Denmark.  There was a bridle hook hanging next to me with several pieces of dirty tack; tack I was supposed to be cleaning.  I was a bit edgy while watching the video.  Most of my attention was still at my job, my working student job.  My job was to clean at least twenty pieces of tack a day, and be ready to ride any horse up to the ring he’d be showing in.  I had been in the saddle all morning taking horses to the ring and warming them up for my trainer.  I continued to watch the three minute video my mom had sent me earlier that day.  The horse looked cute enough.  He jumped average with his front end and tucked his hind end over each jump.  He looked fairly scopey as he landed far past each fence.  The dark horse held his head high holding a loose ring snaffle in his mouth as he cantered around the ring.  At the end of the video there was a picture of him being ridden in the ocean, happily trotting through the waves with his ears pricked.  I smiled to myself.  I finished watching the video and texted my mom back.  “Let’s do it.”.  That’s how I bought my first Warmblood off a video from Europe. Then it was back to work.  I cleaned all the tack that was waiting for me on the hook and jumped back into the grind of the show.

At the time I was a working student for Aaron Vale in Ocala, Florida.  I had been riding with Aaron for almost two years, but I only worked for him for the last few months I rode with him.  The job was a glorified working student position.  I got to ride four to seven horses a day at the farm, often getting to jump at least one of them a day.  I rode all sorts of horses.  Green horses, average horses, Grand Prix horses, and lots of quirky horses.  The experience was like no other.  I never had to groom a horse or clean a stall.  But deep down I knew it wasn’t going to last forever.  Although I had access to so many horses, my goals always came second to everyone else’s.  I had aspirations to do the Junior Jumpers, but I was always given Children Jumpers or green Equitation horses to show.  After we decided to buy the dark bay horse from Denmark, it got harder and harder to go to work and pay to show green Equitation horses.  A week before my new horse who I hadn’t told anyone about arrived, I quit my job at Aaron’s.

I bought the dark bay horse through an agent who imports many horses from Denmark.  Our agent had seen the horse in person, tried him, and thought he would be a good investment horse for me to flip.  She described him as 16.2hh, slab sided, and amateur friendly.  He sounded nice enough, and although very plain, he looked attractive in the conformation photo we saw of him.

A week later the Brookledge van rolled up with my new horse inside.  His name was Nicolosi, or Nico for short.  The driver got out of the truck and looked rather stressed.  Before she opened the doors to the trailer she made some remarks that our horse was a bit rank and we need to be careful.  The driver went inside the trailer to get him, and out came Nico.  The lead rope was quickly tossed to me, and now he was officially mine.  The horse at the end of the lead rope was definitely NOT 16.2hh!  He was over 17hh, had two and a half inches of hair on his head, legs and saddle area, was fifty pounds over weight, and was dragging me wherever he wanted to go, observing everything.  So he was a little obnoxious, giant, and not exactly what we had expected, but I was still excited to be holding my new horse.  Our agent was just as surprised to see how big he was.  She didn’t remember him being this tall…

I’ll never forget my first ride on Nico.  He was barefoot and his feet were trimmed far too short.  This made him shorter strided than he actually was.  Regardless, I felt some serious power underneath me as he pulled me around the ring.  The fat loose ring snaffle I had in his mouth was not giving me very good brakes.  His canter was bouncy and hard to sit, but he felt athletic, and I liked it.

After riding Nico a few times, it was becoming apparent I was not going to be able to flip him right away.  He was a lot of horse that needed some training.  That’s when my unforgettable journey with Nico began.  Little did I know he would be a horse of a lifetime; one who would teach me how to jump jumps as tall as me, gallop around the Rolex ring in Kentucky, and leave me with life lessons.

There’s no point sugar coating; I could not ride Nico when I got him.  Sure, I rode pretty good for my age.  Sure, I had ridden different types of horses, including some difficult ones.  But, I couldn’t ride Nico.  Nico was strong.  He was big.  He had a bit of blood (blood I would learn to love).  And he was the real deal.  I did not own an average children jumper.  I owned a Grand Prix horse.

Just because I couldn’t ride him didn’t mean I wasn’t determined to learn how.  I really didn’t have a choice.  He was not ready to be sold.  My money was invested in him.  I was in it to see it through.

After owning Nico for a few months, one of my trainers started calling him a dragon.  That was a pretty good comparison.  On the ground Nico was no ordinary horse.  He was too smart.  He knew how to pull out of his halter when tied, he knew how to get loose off the lounge line, and he knew how to precisely kick people if they were anywhere near his hind end.  More than once I was the kid running frantically around the show grounds yelling “loose horse!”.  I could never wrap his hind legs, for he would surely try to kick me if I did.  He once managed to kick my vet while he was cautiously walking behind him.  Luckily my vet was okay.  Every time I went to a new barn everyone would say, “Oh, he’s probably just spoiled, we won’t let him get away with that here.”.  Ha! After a month or two everyone just realized there was no changing Nico.  He was how he was.  At ten years old he had already developed a personality of his own.  It’s a good thing everyone who saw him under saddle was impressed by him, because he wasn’t charming anyone on the ground.

I had three different trainers tell me I should save up to keep Nico for Young Riders.  Flattering and inspirational to this day.  I went to all three trainers to help me sell Nico (none of them did).  Disappointing and discouraging to this day.  The first lesson Nico taught me had nothing to do with him.  It had to do with making horses a business.  I’ve made a generalization.  There are exceptions of course, but here’s my generalization.  Trainers don’t look out for their clients, trainers look out for themselves.  Time after time, every trainer I went to strung me along, burning up my potential profits, selling me this big idea I should keep Nico forever.  Granted, Nico wasn’t the easiest horse in the world, but I worked hard with these trainers to make him a more rideable horse.  That is what I was paying them for; to help me make him rideable enough to sell.  Everyone let me down in this area.  No one helped me sell Nico.  It didn’t matter what part of the country, or what prices they charged.  In the end I learned that to make a profit off buying and selling horses, I was going to have to train them myself.  Paying trainers to help me full time cost too much, leading me to want a bigger price tag, which inevitably led to needing more help selling the horse.  It was a hard pill to swallow, but one that I needed to taste in order for me to make better decisions in the future.

My mom grew up in Pony Club, which stamped her with acute organization and horsemanship skills.  Behind the scenes she is the one finding the best products to use on my horses.  She’s the one watching them every day, telling me when they look a little off.  She’s the one who pushes me to to notice the little things, because they can make all the difference in the world.  When you own your own horses and care for them, you start to pay attention to all the little things.  It made me realize there is always something new to learn.  The second thing Nico taught me was how to be a better horseman.

There were times when I decided to be conservative in a jump off, rather than run Nico’s legs off and over phase him.  There were times when I noticed Nico’s stomach was upset and made me realized how it effected my rides.  There was a time when we finally discovered why Nico was so strong and stiff.  It had nothing to do with his personality, it had to do with is spine being a little compressed.  And finally there was a time when I learned to listen to my horse once and for all.  This led me to bury my draw reins in the bottom of my tack trunk because Nico hated them!  Owning my first big jumper taught me so much more than just how to jump big tracks.  It taught me how important it is to be a horseman first, and a competitor second.  I also learned that there is no experience more rewarding than seeing your horse transform into the best version of himself.  It takes a lot of dedication, blood, sweat and tears, but in the end it’s worth it to see your horse blossom.

Nico taking me around the Low Jr. Jumpers at the Kentucky Horse Park

I accomplished some big things with Nico.  Nico took me up to the Medium Junior Jumpers (1.30m).  He took me over my first open water.  He even took me over some Grand Prix sized fences for the first time.  He gave me a resume to be proud of by the time I was 16.  But the biggest accomplishment of all was my last ride on Nico before finally selling him.  On my last ride I rode Nico in a plain loose ring snaffle.  The same snaffle I flatted him in for the whole year I owned him.  I never jumped Nico in the snaffle because he got strong and unrideable.  I played with different bits for jumping.  He went good in a three piece two ring, and a three piece pellham when I showed.  But I had this thing about wanting to ride him in a snaffle.  I used to insist to my trainers that I wanted to ride him in it.  Most of the time I would get an eye roll.  They probably were wondering why I made my life that much more difficult.  But I had a vision that one day I would be able to ride Nico in a snaffle.

Endless hours of flatwork later, on my very last ride, I finally did it; I successfully jumped Nico in a snaffle.  The third lesson Nicolosi taught me was determination.  I learned that if you are determined enough, and put in the hard work, anything is possible.  One of my favorite quotes by Audrey Hepburn says, “Nothing is impossible.  The word itself says, ‘I’m possible!'”.

I went from not being able to ride one side of Nico, to feeling like he was an extension of myself.  By my last show with Nico, things finally fell into place for us.  We finally had developed a true partnership.  I got to watch Nico go from an unrideable 1.20m horse to a legitimate Grand Prix prospect.  That was one unforgettable journey…

Our last show together, jumping clean in the Medium Jr. Jumpers at HITS Ocala