Bridgehampton, N.Y.—Aug. 30  

When the Chronicle’s web editor Molly Sorge asked if I would like to go cover the Hampton Classic for the weekend, I had no idea what I was getting myself into. “Of course!” I said yes, because it’s a horse show and who doesn’t want to go to a horse show, but I severely underestimated how awesome the Hampton Classic is. Having never been to the show before, I assumed it would be just another stop on the nomadic horse show troop’s tour, the last before they all head to indoors and finals this fall.

After being here for just 24 hours, I now know what Molly was really asking me when she called: “Hey college kid stuck in Missouri, would you like to wrap up your summer by spending Labor Day weekend on Long Island watching the Hampton Classic, interviewing riders and eating a mountain of cocktail shrimp in sunny and 75 degree weather?”

Yes. I would like to do exactly that.

Everything about the Hampton Classic screams summer: the pointed tops of blue and white striped tent barns cut clean lines in a light blue sky, framed below by neatly trimmed hedges varying in height from a few feet to nearly 30. Shrimp and crab vendors can be found along sandy paths, with planked walkways leading to grandstands and tents, lending the feeling of a beach boardwalk. A light breeze that you swear carries the scent of the nearby sea floats through the grounds, and the soft thumping of hooves on turf and light conversation provide a soundtrack to what could be a scene straight out of a calendar.  

Its just all so summer-y!

And oh yeah, there are some of the nicest horses in the country jumping around in the rings, too. Not a bad set-up, right?

It was the babies of the bunch that kicked off Saturday’s competition—the $20,000 SHF Enterprise 5-Year-Old Young Jumper Championships Eastern League Final ran its third and final round in the grand prix ring, and it was Devin Ryan who took home the top honors aboard Eddie Blue. Owned by Lori Larrabee, the gelding posted three clear rounds before besting the rest of his class in the jump-off.

Going quadruple clean at 5 is impressive, but it’s not unexpected for Eddie Blue. “He’s never had a rail on his show record,” Ryan said, “And he’s never had a rail at home.” To all the superstitious readers out there, not to worry: Ryan did knock on wood following this statement.

It’s not the first time Ryan has found himself with a tricolor from Young Jumper Championships. He won this very same 5-year-old class last year aboard a mare named Dillandra. His champion this year is known as “Eddie” back in the barn, but equating that cute name with a teddy bear personality would be a mistake.

“To me, he’s an athlete and a worker. He’s not just your barn pet,” Ryan said. “He wants to go out and work; he doesn’t like to sit still and every day I take him out he’s fresh. He’s happy to go out and work, which I would take any day over a puppy dog in the stall. I’d rather have one that bites at me in the stall but wants to go out and work, because in the end for the sport you need that workman like attitude.”

Riding and training young horses is not for anyone looking for a short cut to the blue ribbons—Ryan is quick to point out how much patience is required for anyone involved with the process.

“I think it’s fun, the young horses, and I like bringing them along and building their confidence up and teaching them new things and believing in them,” Ryan explained. “I think there are so many times when people take on a young horse and they just don’t believe enough in them, and they give up too soon. I think sometimes people want the quick fix, and with horses there’s no quick fix.”

Following the 5-year-old class was the $30,000 Split Rock Farm 6-Year-Old Young Jumper Championship  Eastern League Final, and capturing the tricolor was Cody Auer and Imerald Van Het Voorhof. Hailing from Easton, Conn., this is 27-year-old Auer’s first time back at the Hampton Classic since she was a junior, and she returns with a lot more young horse experience under her belt.

“I actually went I worked over in Europe for three years in Holland for Javier Salvador, and that’s what I did over there—riding young horses,” Auer explained. “Its actually what I love to do.

“OK, if you have a big grand prix horse, that’s fun,” Auer admitted with a smile. “But I love bringing them along and seeing what they turn out to be.”

Auer has a special place in her heart for Imerald Van Het Voorhof, a gelding owned by Sarah Ryan and known back in the barn as “Roo” (because, according to Auer, he canters like a kangaroo). “For sure this is the nicest horse I think I’ve actually ever ridden,” Auer said. “Every time I ride him he gets better, every time you challenge him he gets better. He’s amazing.”

If you ask Auer what she’s looking for when hunting for a top jumper, heart trumps rideability every time.

“I think horses need to want to do it. You should get on and feel like they like doing their job,” Auer explained. “Especially when they’re young and not all the buttons are there, like the steering, going forward, coming back. It’s so much about feeling at the jump, and how they use their body. Even if you can’t steer, when you get to the jump and they want to jump it and they do it right, then for sure that’s what you’re looking for. You can add every other part of that.”

Wrapping up interviews with Ryan and Auer, I wandered back to the press tent with every intention of starting to work on an article, but like small children and goldfish, I’m easily distracted by shiny things and loud noises. It was the latter that got me out of the press box—from the far corner of the grounds, music started bumping from loud speakers, accompanied by an announcer inviting people to join in the fun. I accepted his audio invitation, and wasn’t disappointed.

Following the music led to a large square of shops called the Boutique Garden, offering all the shopping a horse show mom could possibly want, and the display of boats and cars could keep dads entertained as well. I found an intricate metal horse sculpture to be my area of interest, though it was equally entertaining to imagine what poor soul got stuck with the gig of getting the Range Rovers in their very tilted display poses.  

If you look up “precarious” in the dictionary, you’ll find this picture.

The far corner of the Boutique Garden opens into a kid’s play area, where a whole host of entertainers were putting on a show inviting kids to dance along to the pop tunes. My personal favorite attraction was the petting zoo—mini pigs and full size llamas were on hand to elicit squeals from the children they poked with their noses, and the whole scene was pretty darn cute!

So this is what all that music was about!

Who doesn’t love a mini pig sticking its tongue out at children?

Some of these children were excited to pet a bunny. Others were past their nap time.

By the time the $40,000 Longines Cup rolled around at one in the afternoon, the Hampton Classic was in full swing. Crowds gathered all around the ring to watch the riders compete, gasping at the first three fences the first rider in the ring cleared before realizing that, well, they all do that. Braver spectators could be found wandering in the wings of the warm-up area, a couple posing for pictures in front of horses standing ringside with their grooms. Media from all sorts of outlets that don’t typically cover horse sport staked out spots around the ring, cameras clicking away at riders they recognized, like Georgina Bloomberg.

Darragh Kenny and Picolo would end up besting the field of 32 starters, collecting his ribbon, sash and Longines watch in a hurry—after the press conference he was hopping on a plane to France to prepare for the 2014 Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games in Normandy, France, where he’s competing on the Irish team.

“Hopefully the Irish team can be very good,” Kenny said of the fast approaching World Games, where the show jumping starts on Sept. 2. “It’s very important to us this year that we qualify for the Olympics. We’ve missed now two Olympics as a team, which is quite disappointing for us as a nation with the amount of top riders that we have, so it’s very important that we qualify this year.”

That being said, Kenny also wanted to do well in the Hamptons this weekend, and he had to have his game face off to pull of Saturday’s win. Ramiro Quintana went first in the nine-rider jump-off, and his round left those that came after scrambling to beat his time, including third-place finisher Lillie Keenan, who rode her 8-year-old horse Balance, the gelding’s first time competing in a 1.50-meter class.

“I watched Ramiro go and I thought he was incredibly fast, and Ramiro is a top rider, so when he goes fast and he leaves the jumps up he’s usually very hard to beat,” Kenny explained. “I also watched Lillie go, because she’s young and very hungry,” Kenny continued with a chuckle, “so she likes to go very fast and put a little pressure on me sometimes, so when she didn’t catch [Quintana] I knew how fast he was.”

Kenny found a way to beat Quintana early in his jump-off. “I knew Ramiro had done eight strides from one to two, and I did seven,” Kenny explained, “and then I knew my horse was naturally quite quick so I just relied on that a little bit.”

After the riders were done speaking and the press conference was wrapping up, a toast was proposed to Kenny as he headed to France, and for Quintana and Keenan on their finishes. A bit of comic relief was served when someone began handing out the champagne flutes, going down the line to Keenan before she politely declined, telling the woman she was underage and eliciting a laugh from those in attendance. It was a nice reminder that Keenan does compete with and regularly beat the most seasoned professionals in the business, and she’s all of 17 years old.

Check back in tomorrow evening when I’ll have coverage of the very exciting $250,000 Hampton Classic Grand Prix CSI-W!