“I always hoped… my friends in college and I always talked about having our ‘top hat horse.’ We wanted to get to FEI. Once it was time, I was actually very superstitious about starting FEI. I refused to get a shadbelly until I knew we could do the entire Prix St Georges without any issues,” Becky Sturdy said.

But now that shadbelly’s getting quite a bit of use, as the math teacher shows her off-the-track Thoroughbred Raphael at Intermediaire I. (She wears a helmet, not a top hat, though.)

The pair has picked up quite a collection of year-end awards. Last year alone, they took home three of the North American Thoroughbred Society’s national year-end awards, including the Fourth Level Champion and Fourth Level Musical Freestyle Champion. They were the Jockey Club Thoroughbred Incentive Program year-end FEI-level and Fourth Level Champion, year-end In-Hand Reserve Champion; and earned their USDF Silver Medal and Silver Freestyle Bar.

Sturdy and Raphael are a bit of an anomaly at the FEI levels—a Thoroughbred ridden by an amateur without unlimited funds. Raphael, now 14, was known in his former life as Red Phase. He’s former racehorse that Sturdy found at Great Lakes Downs (Mich.) 10 years ago through a listing on the Communication Alliance to Network Thoroughbred Ex-Racehorses (CANTER) Michigan website, where Raphael’s race trainer listed him for rehoming.

In six starts, Raphael had failed to come in first, second, or third. Sturdy says that knowing him, she’s not too surprised by that.

Raphael in his former life, under the name Red Phase on the track. Photo courtesy of Becky Sturdy

“He is a mama’s boy, which I did not do on purpose,” she said. “He loves to play with his buddies outside. I think he liked to be with his friends. If he ever led [in a race], it was very briefly. He definitely was not a super fast runner… which is good for me I suppose.”

Sturdy learned to ride jumpers as a youngster when, as she remembers it, her first grade teacher called her parents and told them if they didn’t get her riding lessons, young Sturdy wasn’t going to stop talking about horses in class. Her first exposure to dressage was in the movie Sylvester, and the notion of dancing horses stuck with her.

 As an adult, she was interested in continuing her journey in dressage. “Red,” as she calls him, seemed amenable to that profession, but it took a little while for Sturdy and her trainer Amy Lewis to realize just how much potential he had.

“My first instructor thought, ‘Oh, first level,’” she said. “I really wanted to get my bronze medal on him, so that was my goal. The instructor I have now was worried he’d max out at third level—we were still dealing with on-again, off-again hock arthritis. But then, the harder stuff got, the happier he was.”

Sturdy and Red started showing in 2009 at first level and have steadily progressed up the levels since.

Red and Sturdy have earned awards from the North American Thoroughbred Society and the USDF all-breeds at first, second, third, fourth, and Prix St. Georges levels. They just started showing at I-1 this year and Red is sounder than ever.

Becky Sturdy and her off-the-track Thoroughbred Raphael have earned quite a few top ribbons at the FEI levels. Photo by David Honor Photography

Sturdy and Red get lessons from Lewis but Sturdy has done almost all the riding herself. She jokes that once she gets Red to the Grand Prix level, Lewis can sit on him. She’s almost surprised she hasn’t needed someone else to get in the stirrups yet, but so far Sturdy and Red seem to work out their confusion on their own.

That could be because of how well they know each other at this point. Sturdy, who works as a high school math teacher and a tutor near Chicago, is at the barn daily, even if it’s just to pick Red’s stall. She has learned his quirks, which include a refusal to eat if he’s not in work. He’s afraid of dogs, but loves ponies, thinking they are his personal entourage. He has a collection of brightly-colored matching saddle pads, fly bonnets, and polos, though he seems to prefer blue over green.

“I think I miss like five days a year at the barn,” she said. “The five days I miss, I get like five text messages from everyone at the barn like, ‘See, he’s OK!’”

Raphael taking a nap. Photo courtesy of Becky Sturdy

Extracurricular flying lead changes (fours, threes, twos, and ones were spontaneously included in their last test) have been their nemesis. As with any challenges, math teacher Sturdy breaks each test or problem into pieces just like an equation. She tries not to drill tough dressage work too often, mixing in hill work and jumping outside the arena whenever she can.

Sturdy says perhaps surprisingly, she doesn’t get nervous in the ring, even at the FEI level. She says she goes in aiming for no major mistakes, and a score above 60, both of which are attainable for the pair. For the most part, she doesn’t notice much breed bias from dressage judges for riding a Thoroughbred, though she does find that she can make up points she might lose for stride length by being very accurate to the test. Usually, that works out for her just fine.

Now that she has her “top hat horse,” Sturdy is savoring the experience, knowing that the curtains could fall on Red’s career if his old injuries flare up again.

“Every show is a gift at this point. He’s had a suspensory injury, he’s had hock arthritis. The vets are just like, ‘Wow, he looks better every time we see him,’” she said. “I’m not sure how he would ever truly retire because he’s a workaholic. If it ends up that we are just doing trail riding and less real dressage, that works for me. I have no aspiration to get another horse to show. I like showing him.

“He’s mine to the end, for sure.”