United States Eventing Association

Once a winner, always a winner.

For one horse in particular, this saying holds true regardless of the job asked of him. The former 2003 World Champion and eight-time Dutch Champion in combined driving, His Highness, more affectionately known as “Nike,” will be gracing us with his presence this week at the Nutrena USEA American Eventing Championships.

“He came over to the US and just fell through the cracks,” said Beth Stelzleni, who retrained Nike to event. After she began riding him, she dug around on the internet and discovered that the horse had competed in combined driving in his younger years, and with a huge amount of success.

“Through a series of events, he ended up with my student, Jamie Mitchell, who had never evented before. He has since taught her to event, taking her to the AEC in Beginner Novice last year and this year at Novice. And, he's 20 years old.”

Stelzleni explained that she first came across Nike through Kathy Schultz who owns Stelzleni’s home base at Wishing Tree Farm (Danielsville, GA). Schultz had stumbled across the retired driver when the University of Georgia was looking to retire some of their school horses. Although she knew nothing about his famous history, she thought there was something special about the horse and took him home.

“He was well trained on the flat, you could tell,” said Stelzleni, who took over the task of legging Nike up and training him as an event horse, without any knowledge of his past. “He was rusty, but he had all the buttons. He just didn’t know how to jump.”

Stelzleni admits that retraining a big-bodied Dutch Warmblood, standing 17 hands that had no idea how to use his body over a jump, was more than a bit unnerving at first.

“It was terrifying,” Stelzleni laughed as she recounted her first horse trials experience with a horse that was hyped by a show atmosphere, but was very new to jumping. “I have honestly never been so scared in start box. At the first show, I retired him at the third fence.”
Aldato.info photo

Once she and Nike came to an agreement about jumping, Jamie Mitchell, a student at the University of Georgia, took over the ride and ultimately bought him.

“To be honest, the first couple of rides were…difficult,” said Mitchell. “I rode hunter/jumper for years and to start this new thing of eventing on this big warmblood that was so much horse… it was kind of crazy. Now our favorite phase is cross-country, which I had never even done before him. He’s an incredible teacher.”

Mitchell’s first novice was also Nike’s first novice, and the pair have been consistently taking home the ribbons ever since. This week, they will be competing in the Novice Amateur division at AEC.

“I want to give him a chance to show off! He knows he’s a celebrity, and has no idea that he’s 20 years old,” Mitchell said. “He he had such a high profile career before I had him, and I feel so lucky to be able to ride him now.”