United States Eventing Association

Can’t Keep a Good Horse Down: Ava Vojnovic and LH Clean Slate’s Comeback

“This guy has been through a lot.”

According to Ava Vojnovic, that was Olympian Boyd Martin’s reaction upon seeing her horse, LH Clean Slate at a clinic last month. He hit the nail on the head. Since 2022, “Slate” has struggled with a multitude of injuries that kept him out of work for just under three years. It all started in 2022, when Vojnovic and Slate started having difficulties under saddle that kept ending up with Vojnovic on the ground.

“All throughout that year, I'd fallen off at a couple shows, or gotten eliminated. And we thought it was so strange. It was not him. And so finally, after the [USEA] Intercollegiate Championships—I ended up falling off there too, which was really unfortunate—we decided to take him to Auburn University to get a full workup and see if maybe he needs injections or something,” Vojnovic said.

“He was sound the day before the exam, and then the morning of the exam he came up very lame and very sore," she continued. "They said they thought it was his suspensory ligaments. We tried shockwave therapy. We did PRP [platelet rich plasma] injections. And then six months later, they said that he would need surgery. So he ended up getting a fasciotomy and a neurectomy surgery in November of 2022 on both of his hind legs.”

While an injury this severe could be career-ending on its own, Slate wasn’t out of the woods yet. He was just coming back under saddle and had looked beautifully sound when he suddenly went lame—again. Originally, veterinarians told Vojnovic that she would have to retire the 9-year-old Thoroughbred (With Distinction x Genutech). Having purchased the gelding off the track when he was just 3 years old, Vojnovic wasn’t ready to give up on her dreams for their future just yet.

“We ended up getting a second opinion at Coosa Valley Equine in Alabama,” Vojnovic said. “They found a deep bone bruise that needed about a year to heal, and he'd only been in rehab for about six or seven months at that point. So we figured we’d try again.”

In October 2023, Vojnovic tried to bring Slate back into work only to find him lame once again. This time, the culprit was an injury that impacts many ex-racehorses: kissing spine. After a couple more weeks out of work, the veterinarian came to the barn to give Slate back injections. Vojnovic was in class when she got a phone call.

“I get a call, and it's the vet, and he says, ‘Hey, Ava, Slate's eye is really swollen, so we're gonna look at it and see what the issue is.’ I'm like, ‘OK, I'm in class. Just let me know. He calls me back again and says, ‘Hey, I'm really sorry. It's a trauma abscess, so we're not going to be able to do the back injections,’ ” said Vojnovic. “That was, for me, one of the most shocking phone calls to get. After all the other injuries, I was just so tired of it all at that point. But I figured we could add it into the rest of his rehab routine.”

Despite Vojnovic’s best efforts, Slate’s eye didn’t respond to treatment. After a couple weeks of around-the-clock eye medications, Vojnovic made the tough decision to have the eye removed.

“While we were loading him up after his surgery, I asked, ‘When do you think he’ll be able to ride again?’ And they said, ‘Oh, like two weeks,’ ” said Vojnovic. “That was so interesting to me. It is such a small change for them, but such a huge change for us because we can see it. But once we got his back figured out and he had recovered from eye surgery I was riding again.”

Finally, Slate was under saddle and going well. Vojnovic was just starting to take a breath and enjoy being reunited with her horse—when they had an accident while doing some conditioning work in a field. “Slate got excited and stepped into a drainage pipe. He almost sliced his whole heel bulb off,” Vojnovic said. “That was the injury where I thought it was going to be the end. That was terrifying. That was the most blood I've ever seen.”

Luckily, it was just a flesh wound—a particularly gruesome one—but after another two months of stall rest, Vojnovic says you can hardly tell it happened. In total, Slate and Vojnovic had to take over two years off of riding. It was a really difficult period for Vojnovic, who wasn’t sure if the next injury would be the one that put Slate into retirement.

“A huge part of what kept me going was my mom [Susan Vojnovic]. She has been a huge part of my riding career, both my mom and my dad, have” Vojnovic said. “My mom and I have felt the same emotions throughout all this. We cried together, we went through the successes together. I was so lucky to have her.”

Ava attends college at Auburn University and, despite not having a horse to ride, she joined the school’s eventing team, which turned out to be key in keeping her spirits up until she could get back in the saddle.

“They have been amazing and so helpful. I have been the Merchandise Chair for the team for the past three years, so I've gotten really close to the other girls on the Executive Committee, and everyone has been so nice, so helpful,” Ava said. “They’re so happy for us when things go right, and they're sad with me when things go wrong.”

“They all offered their horses to me,” Ava continued. “At the beginning, I was just a little too sad to want to ride somebody else's horse because I'd gotten Slate to the point where he was becoming a great horse. We were doing so well before this all happened. And I was just kind of bitter at the start, but I wish I had said yes because they all have such amazing horses!”

Slate and Ava’s comeback was made official at the Stable View Eventing Academy (Aiken, South Carolina) in December 2024. After schooling the cross-country course the day before, Ava and Slate competed in a combined test on Sunday. Together, they finished in second place.

“He's not super fit yet, and I felt like three phases in one day could be a lot for his brain and his body, so the combined test was great. We got a 33.5 in dressage, and, of course, cross-country was going on right next to us, so I was very happy with how he just stayed really calm,” Ava said. “We did two stadium rounds. Our first one we had a rail, just because I was so nervous I couldn’t help him out there. And then for the second round, we had our first clear show jumping round in years, not even counting the two years we weren't riding.”

To the strangers watching at the edge of the ring, it looked like any other Beginner Novice show jumping round, but to Ava and her mother, it was anything but. “That was pretty special," Ava said. "I came out of the ring with tears in my eyes and went right to my mom. She was also crying, and I think people were kind of confused. Like, this is just a 2’6” round, you know? But they don't know our story. It was really special. I'm so glad that my mom was there to experience it with me, too.”

The toughest times often teach us the most. While Ava wasn’t actively riding Slate from 2022 to 2024, she was still learning. Despite the hardships she and Slate have gone through, Ava says that, looking back, she feels it only strengthened their partnership.

“I would have to go out to the barn every day for at least 40 minutes just to walk him by hand. So it kind of forced me to slow down a little bit and appreciate the little things. Like, ‘Oh wow, today he's super calm, or he's wanting to do this, or he gets to say hi to this horse today.’ So I definitely learned to appreciate the time we have together,” Ava said.

In spite of lots of required stall rest, Ava says Slate has come out the other side changed for the better.

“A lot of people used to think that he was a crazy horse when he was younger, but it's nice to know that all my efforts throughout this time to help him calm down and just relax are starting to show to other people,” Ava said. “I don't know if that makes any sense, but there’s just something in me that thinks ‘Wow.’ He really is a sweet horse. He has done so much for me, and he could be bitter and mean towards me and try to bite me after everything he's been through, you know? But I think he knows that my mom and I have really pushed for him and been his voice.”

Ava has taken things slow this winter, focusing on Slate’s fitness and seeing how things go as he comes back into work. Most recently, they went to Martin's clinic on St. John’s Island, South Carolina. “For me, to go from not knowing if I’d ever be able to ride or jump Slate again, to Boyd Martin saying we’re 'pretty freaking good!' is just so meaningful.”

Looking ahead to the future, Ava is aiming to ride Slate in the USEA Intercollegiate Championships (Aiken, South Carolina) this May for the Auburn University Eventing Team. It will be a full circle moment for the pair, as the Intercollegiate Championships are what started their journey three years ago.

Reflecting on everything they’ve been through, Ava has developed a new perspective on her relationship with her horse.

“Slate has been absolutely amazing. He is so willing to just learn new things, slow down, and figure it out,” she said. “I think I have really figured out that there's no rush. When I was younger, I felt like I needed to be doing this level by this year, or if he isn't doing it well enough then we need to keep him progressing, or whatever. But he was supposed to retire two years ago. Everything that we're doing now is just a miracle.”