United States Eventing Association

Hi! My name’s Alyssa Ford and my horse, Bold Discovery, and I are already qualified for the AEC!

I bough "Black" in the beginning of January and we haven't looked back since! He was a two star horse looking for a junior to bring along; I was a timid cross-country rider who needed a confidence booster after having a horse that stopped - a lot.

The first time I rode him, I fell off, and I knew he was the one - after all he called me out on my stuff! But he knew how far out of my comfort zone to push me and how far was too far. Black was the horse to get my confidence back and to learn how to enjoy eventing again!

I attend college in South Carolina so we started our season early - the end of February to be exact! We started off doing Beginner Novice at a Jumping Branch Schooling Horse Trials in order to get my nerves out of the way. To say that Black was a superstar is an understatement! We won our first event together and I knew then I wasn't too crazy to set my sights on going to AEC at Novice.

Pine Top was next and it was the most fun I have had at an event in a long time! Smiling Horse Farm can make a party anywhere - especially at the most beautiful facility with perfect weather! We ended 2nd out of a huge division and that meant we were almost qualified!

Next up was FENCE HT in Tryon, NC. Black put in a good dressage test and our best show jump round to date. With a solid cross-country finish we secured 2nd again! This meant we definitely had our qualification we just needed another clean cross-country to promise us a trip to the AEC.

Black and I arrived home from college in Maryland just in time to head to Schwan Downs for MCTA's Horse Trials! This has always been one of my favorite events in Area II but because the Novice course is known to be big, I had not been in three years. At the time, I had a horse that stopped so we didn't need a big Novice! But because Black and I had a great start to the season I decided to give it a shot! It turned out to be a great day. I was first after dressage but because of a couple stupid miscommunication errors on my part, we had a stop in show jumping which dropped us to 4th but we ended the day with our best cross-country run to date. Nothing beats a confidence boosting cross-country round!

So if everything goes as planned we'll see everyone at AEC!!

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