The stylish Camira proves to be his winning partner in the hunter derby.

Trot fences, utilized by horsemen everywhere as one of the most rudimentary tools for training and warm-up, aren’t always so rudimentary after all. Sometimes they can be the undoing of even the most experienced horses and riders.

Or so it occasionally seemed during the $15,000 The Chronicle of the Horse/USHJA International Hunter Derby at the Texas Rose Horse Park in Tyler, held during the Texas Sport Horse Cup, Sept. 2-6.

Peter Pletcher, who bested 31 other entrants, said that a trot fence in the handy round was designed to pose a subtle trap.

“It might have been the hardest test of that course,” stated Pletcher, who piloted Melanie Barnes’ 10-year-old mare Camira to first place in the two-phased event. He also finished third on Eva Bisso’s Westview and sixth on Meridian Farm’s Dominick.

The trot fence appeared midway through the handy round. Riders were coming off a long hand-gallop over a log jump, followed by a relatively narrow U-turn off the rail to the trot fence, which, in the classic round, had been the first element of a one-stride in-and-out comprised of two oxers. But for the handy round, that first fence was reduced to a three-foot vertical.

“You had to trot in and canter out,” Pletcher explained, “so a lot of people were asking themselves: ‘Should we do one stride? Should we do two?’ When I walked the handy course, the in-and-out still walked as a one, so I figured if you were trotting, it would be two. But you really had to [collect] your trot.”

Adding to the challenge for Pletcher was Camira’s 17-hand size. “She could have easily done the one stride,” he said, “but I really felt that the test was asking for the two, as if you were in the hunting field. So I angled her a little bit over the trot fence, to make it more of a bowing two-stride, and she did it amazingly well.”

While judges George Morris, Ginger Black, Dacia Johnson and Carol Dean-Porter only placed the pair third in the handy round, Camira’s decisive win in the classic round sealed the deal.

Camira’s grand total of 417 was just 5 points ahead of second-placed finishers Courtney Calcagnini and Ovation, a horse owned by Taylor Reid. Jana Rodes and Dress Up won the handy round and were fourth overall, while Ovation was runner-up in both rounds.

Bunny Does Best

Pletcher found Camira in Germany in 2004 and brought her back to his farm in Magnolia, just north of Houston. Barnes, who has owned the mare ever since (and shows her in the adult amateur hunter division), gave her the barn name of “Bunny”—an affectionate reference to the horse’s extra-long ears. Pletcher also campaigns Camira in the second year green hunters.

“When I first got Camira,” Pletcher recalled, “she was barely broke, and she didn’t have the greatest mouth. But over the years, she’s really improved. We just recently started doing some four-foot jumps with her.”

Camira finished second in the hunter derby at the Pin Oak Charity Horse Show (Texas) last March.

“I always know she’s going to try any jump. She’s never going to spook, and she’s super easy,” he said. “She’s totally bombproof. You could aim that horse at literally anything, and she’d jump it.”

But he believes other attributes also make her a derby standout. “She’s a beautiful mover, and she stays at one rhythm throughout the course,” he said. “She can make sharp turns without changing her speed.”

Pletcher had high praise for derby course designer (and show operations manager) Britt McCormick of Horse Shows of Dallas LLC. “He did a fantastic job,” said Pletcher. “In fact, I went to this horse show because I wanted to support Britt. He did a really great job with the entire show.”

When walking the course, Pletcher was shocked. “I was saying: ‘This is harder than [the ASG Software Solutions/USHJA International Hunter Derby Finals in Lexington, Ky.]. But it really rode well, and there was a great choice of jumps.”

Those jumps began with a split-rail oxer with a minimal ground line as the first obstacle in the classic round.

“That very first jump was probably one of the hardest jumps on the course,” Pletcher observed. “I think for people who are new at riding in these derbies, that’s a really hard type of jump. Any of the split-rails seem to be the ones that fall down the most.”

Pletcher also had a healthy respect for one of the option jumps, “a big, solid, four-foot red wall with a white rail on it, off a turn. That was hard, too. Most of the people who chose to do it did it well, but it was one of those that if you looked at it, you were like: ‘Oh my God.’ ”

Other jumps included a vertical hedge, an oversized log jump, a 3’6″ crossrail with no ground line, a wishing well, a brush oxer, a brush-covered coop and a white oxer covered with red and pink flowers. For decoration, there was a huge cannon at one end of the ring.

“The cannon was pretty,” Pletcher said, “but a lot of horses spooked at it. The course was very flowing, but it was long, for sure. Your horse definitely had to be fit! The options that Britt gave you created the challenge. I mean, if you wanted to play it safe, you could. But obviously, if you wanted to win, you couldn’t play it safe.”

Valiant Efforts Lauded

Pletcher had plenty of praise for his third-placed mount Westview, who does the adult amateur classes with owner Bisso.

“We bought him this year at the end of Florida [WEF],” Pletcher said. “He’s really pretty and really sweet. He has a huge stride, so you have to be able to look as though you’re flowing to the jumps, even though you’re having to go kind of slow. The judges really like his style—not just his jumping style but his overall presence.”

Pletcher started riding Dominick, a 9-year-old Belgian Warmblood, in August, just before the Derby Finals.

“He went really nicely, too. Sydney Keith [of Meridian Farm] sent him to me from Colorado,” he said. “He’s a super horse. He’s only about 15.2 hands, but he can sure jump—like 4’6″ and 4’9″. I never batted an eye at choosing the bigger options for him. He was a junior jumper before this, so he’s another jumper turned hunter, which is the perfect type for these derby horses.”