Carson Masters Spring Premier

SRF's Silver Sundown

Stoner Ridge Farm crew and clients had a great time this past weekend at the Spring Premier held in Winchester at the KEC. The weather was warm and windy but the horses didn't seem to mind. It was a great time for a horse show. We took 14 horses. Cesario and Lisa joined Robert, Charlie, Mike, and me to make sure had enough help to get everyone ready for their classes. All the horses did well. It is always exciting early in the year because there are so many horses making their debut in the ring. We took the Cross Filly for Dale Honn for her maiden voyage around the show ring. Mike did a great job and the filly performed well in a tough classes. CD's Girl's Got Rhythm also made her show debut. She placed 4th in a really challenging classic class She is for sale, by the way, and the proceeds will go to UMH to support the show program. Our young horses that have just begun showing looked wonderful. Pepper's Capital Venture owned by Steve Heuslein made his strongest showing yet placing 2nd in the 3 yo Classic Stallions/Geldings class. Sandman's Taking Cances (Manny) owned by Don and Nancy Copland placed second in the the Open Four Gait class. Mountain Vista Thunder showed in a very challenging classic stallions class. He improves with every show. He's owned by Bob and Marty Morris. LA Bud's Rock My World (Roxie) owned by Howard and Terry Kleier made a great show under Mike Butler's direction. She was awesome. We have great hopes for her this year. She has so much style! Another awesome horse this weekend was RPM's Squirrel's Blackfoot owned by Randy and Regina Jones. He won the Open Four Gait and 2 & 3 yo Trail Pleasure class. Woo Hoo! He also placed 5th in Conformation and Pro Am which led to 2nd place in Adult Versatility. Congratulations! Our more experienced horses included Barb' Stormy Knight. We took him for Marcia Spencer to show in the novice and amateur class. Nancy also showed him in the Ladies Auxiliary Trail class. Merry Go Blue was beautiful as always in the the Classic Stallions class placing 3rd. Legendary Lady was great in Trail Obstacle with her owner Judy Brummer in the irons. She placed 2nd in a class of 16 horses. She also placed 3rd in the Pro Am Trail class and 5th for Adult Versatility. Nugget was ridden by Charlie, his trainer, and by Steve and me (Lyngle). He placed first in the Gelding Classic class and Non Pro. Steve and Charlie placed 4th in the Pro Am class and Nugget placed 5th in the championship. Sonny's Smokey Mountain had several great rides including Pro Am and the Gelding's Classic class placing 5th. Gaitway's Jasmine Joy won the Open Western class with a great performance. She also placed 2nd with Steve in the Country Trail Mares class and 4th in the Pro Am CTP class leading her to place 3rd for Adult Versatility. SRF's Silver Sundown, however, had the best show of the weekend. Highlights included winning the Adult Versatility, Trail Obstacle, Men's Trail, and the Trail Pleasure Championship. UMH has a Triple Crown Award. Horses must win a championship in their division at the Spring Premier, Summer Celebration, and Kentucky State. Silver will be in the running! Only one horse has ever won this prestigious award. We're lookin forward to future competitons. We're really proud of the horse's accomplishments.

Stoner Ridge Takes Three Phase Honors

The annual Three Phase Event was held at the Kentucky Equestrian Center in Winchester, KY yesterday. It was a beautiful day for this type of competition. Horses had to compete in dressage, stadium obstacle, and cross country (no jumps). Due to storms being forcast for today, the cross country portion of the competition was run late yesterday afternoon. Stoner Ridge Farm had five horses to compete. Three of the horses had two different riders. We were really proud of how well everyone did! They were the stars of the show. You'll be able to read more about the event in the May newsletter. See results of Beginner Novice and Novice below. SRF had no horses competing at the Training level. See the Three Phase web site for full results (www.threephaseevent.org). Congratulations!

SRF Overall winners:

AGMH High Point Ribbon - Legendary Lady

High Point Over All Beginner Novice/Novice Barb's Stormy Knight

Novice Adult: 1st Erin DeAtley - Barb's Stormy Knight, 2nd Charlie DeAtley - SRF's Silver Sundown, 3rd Robert Lawson - Legendary Lady, 4th Robert Lawson - Gaitway's Jasmine Joy

Beginner Novice Adult: 1st Judy Brummer - Legendary Lady and 3rd Mike Butler on Sonny's Smokey Mountain

Youth Novice: 1st Lauren Hickey - Gaitway's Jasmine Joy

Youth Beginner Novice: 2nd Lauren Hickey - Barb's Stormy Knight

Individual Element of Dressage: 1st Erin on Barb's Stormy Knight and 2nd Robert on Legenday Lady

Individual Element of Stadium Obstacle: 1st Judy Brummer on Legendary Lady and 2nd Charlie on SRF's Silver Sundown

Individual Element of Cross Country: 1st Charlie on SRF's Silver Sundown

KMSHA Junior Robinson Memorial Horse Show

Even with the gloomy skies and bad weather warnings, the Junior Robinson Memorial Horse Show at the Horse Park began with only slight a delay on Friday. Randy and Regina Jones were here all the way from Conway, AR. Tim and Marcia Spencer from Georgetown joined us and Nancy Copland came on Saturday. Regina was excited to be showing their 3 year old colt, RPM Squirrel's Blackfoot herself for the first time. Marcia has been taking lessons on Stormy and decided that she was ready to show too. Robert recommended the novice trail class where the ladies did a great job! They were well prepared and confident. Regina placed second and Marcia placed third. Congratulations ladies! They went on to show in the amateur class. Nancy showed Stormy in the amateur championship and placed third in tough competition. Way to go! We took 7 horses and they all placed in their classes. Congratulations to Silver Sundown for his outstanding performances. He won the trail pleasure stallions class, placed 3rd in conformation, 2nd in trail obstacle and western. He also placed 3rd in the trail pleasure championship. His success allowed him to place reserve for the Junior Robinson Memorial Award for stallions. Mike did a great job on Sonny's Smokey Mountain placing 3rd in his under saddle class and trail obstacle which also led to a reserve placement for the mares/geldings division of the same award. We were really impressed with Squirrel's performance this weekend. It was his first show this year and he was so steady on the rail it was hard to believe. In his first open four gait class he received a unanimous first place tie from all three judges. Charlie rode Highland's Poudre Bell (her first show ever) to place second in the four gait class and fourth in her under saddle class. Another 'newbie' was Highland's Poudre Java. Mike rode him to a third place tie in his trail pleasure class. Pepper's Capital Venture also showed well placing fifth in a tough three year old gelding/mare class. It's cool to watch the young ones grow and develop. We had a good time visiting with everyone in spite of some rain and and cold temperatures.

Al Prewitt Memorial Horse Show

The Al Prewitt Memorial Horse Show in Fletcher, NC turned out to be a great one for Stoner Ridge Farm. We had lots of excited clients join us for the first shows of the season (it actually counted as two separate shows). Bob Morris from PA, Nancy Copland from IN, Judy Brummer from IL, Steve Heuslein from MN, all came from out of state to see their horses show. Terry Kleier, Cassie Thompson and Marcia and Tim Spencer all came from here in KY. We had a great time. There were over 90 classes in the two day period so we all worked really hard to get all the horses ready to show and entered in their appropriate classes. Special congratulations goes to SRF's Silver Sundown (owned by Steve Heuslein) for his many wins over the two days. He won the Stallion Trail Pleasure class, Open Western, Trail Obstacle, and both Trail Pleasure Championships - Woo Hoo! Steve also placed him second in the Amateur Trail class. His many wins helped him win the Versatility Award as well. One of Steve's other horses, Gaitway's Jasmine Joy also did very well at this show. She placed second in Versatility and won the Country Trail Pleasure Mares, the Amateur Country Trail Pleasure, and placed reserve in the championship with Steve in the irons. Congratulations! Other horses did well also. Sandman's Taking Chances owned by Nancy Copland won the canter class his very first time at a show. He also placed in his other classes. Judy Brummer's 9 year old mare, Legenday Lady (two time Sam Tuttle winner) won the Mares Trail Pleasure class with Judy up. Way to go Judy! Other horses that ribboned this weekend were Highland's Poudre Lyric, Pepper's Capital Venture, Mountain Vista Thunder, RRF Gold Nugget, and Sonny's Smokey Mountain. Our congratulations goes out to Cassie Thompson for winning the Juvenile Versatility and the Jacob Lutz Youth Memorial Award. The Al Prewitt Memorial Horse Show was especially well attended this year. I have never seen this quality of horses so early in the year. There were actually 19 horses in the 4 and over conformation class! It was a great competition.

Clinton Jones Wins Natural Horse Vet Natural Horsemanship Trainer's Challenge

Even though Saturday morning was cold, the competition was hot at the Natural Horse Vet Natural Horsemanship Trainer's Challenge held at Stoner Ridge Farm. Clinton Jones, Tim Scarberry, and Chris Tipton were all charged with the task of starting three Merry Go Blue two year old geldings. The challenging part, was that they only had a total of three hours to start their horse and build enough foundation that would allow their horse to be ridden successfully through a trail obstacle course. It was amazing what all three trainers were able to accomplish! When time was up, it was unbelievable what these horses could do. The trainers had to ride their horse at a walk, intermediate gait, and canter, pick up all four feet, back, weave through cones, walk over ground poles, step over an elevated pole, and drag a bag. For additional points their horse had to push a 6' ball out of a circle. An additional element was the free style where trainers choose skills to show what their horse had learned. Chris played polo with Rainy Day Blues while Tim Scarberry had Singing the Blues up on a six foot wooden box - then he turned a leaf-blower on his new equine friend with no resistance. Clinton Jones, however, had the most extensive free style. He began with a spray bottle and moved on to cracking a whip while standing on his horse's back. He also used a chain saw (with the chain removed) to demonstrate his horse's trust. Finally, he rode Maximum Blue bareback with an 8' x 10' tarp spread over him - he rode with only one lead rope as a rein. Wow! It was too cool. We really appreciate the great turn out and all our sponsors! Yee Haw - if you weren't here you really missed out on a great opportunity to learn about different colt starting styles and seeing these excellent trainers in action. The point spread was within 14 out of about 700 points possible. The guys were totally awesome! Be sure to check out the newsletter that will be posted on the web site on April 1st for additional photos and more detail about this great competition.

Road to the Horse 2009

Our congratulations to Richard Winters for winning the Road to the Horse competition in Franklin, TN today! He did an oustanding job working his horse in the round pen yesterday and continued what he started today. He had the right combination of sensitivity and control that helped his horse learn. The trail obstacle part of the program was the most challenging we've seen. Horses had to walk, trot, canter, back, turn a 180, and the riders had to mount and dismount. Then they had to go through the obstacles which included serpentines, spiraling raised poles, regular ground poles, elevated poles, lasso, drag, jump, and the patience box (horses had to stand calmly as long as possible). Finally, there was an optional obstacle where the horse had to approach a cage of live chickens. All the competitors, Richard Winters, John Lyons, and Tommy Garland did a fantastic job with their quarter horses. We had a blast!

Be sure to make room in your calender - next Saturday, March 21st, Stoner Ridge Farm will be hosting the Natural Horse Vet (R) Natural Horsemanship Trainer's Challenge. Three Merry Go Blue geldings will be started in round pens by trainers Chris Tipton, Tim Scarberry, and Clinton Jones. Our judges will be Laurie Quincey, Charlie DeAtley, and Erin DeAtley. We are excited about the competition. It is an opportunity to see Mountain Horse training at it's best!