Mill Spring, N.C.—May 17
She won the $10,000 USHJA International Hunter Derby on Friday night, and then she came back for the $50,000 WCHR Open Hunter Classic today and won that too. It’s safe to say Kelley Farmer is on a roll.
“It’s been a nice week!” said Farmer. “I thought it was a lovely class. That ring is nice. The horses jumped well. It was so nice for them to give that kind of money for a hunter classic.”
Farmer’s mount for today’s win was Point Being, an 8-year-old warmblood of unrecorded breeding owned by Derby Hill and Larry Glefke. The gelding earned scores of 87.5 and 91 in the first round, and then scores of 89 and 92 in the second for a total score of 359.5.
“He tries so hard,” said Farmer. “He sometimes tries too hard. That’s nothing you want to fault. That’s what we love about him.”
“When he walks into the ring, he always tries to jump the top of the standards,” added Glefke, trainer at Lane Change Farm in Keswick, Va., with Farmer. “Jimmy Torano, Kent Farrington, they always say, ‘You need to take him to the other ring.’ I say, ‘Well, if he makes it in the other ring, this is still a great experience for him.’ ”
Farmer, who had six horses in the 20-horse class, was also second (with Dalliance, 354.5), fourth (with Taken), sixth (with Mindful) and 12th with So To Speak. The class was held at different heights, with the ring crew adjusting the fences at the Tryon International Equestrian Center from the 3’3” height up to 4’.
“Having so many rides is better for me because then I don’t get all caught up in one horse,” she said. “I’m much better when I’m busy because then I don’t over analyze. There’s a reason we have a lot of them.”
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Point Being and Farmer were a team last year, competing in the high performance and regular conformation hunters, and then the horse spent the winter competing with Vanessa Brown on the West Coast. He came back to Lane Change Farm just before the Kentucky Spring shows. Then he contested the $35,000 USHJA International Hunter Derby in Texas on May 10, finishing 10th, and he was third in Friday’s Tryon derby.
“It’s just been getting to know him again. I’m excited to have him back. I’ve always loved him. He always has that much intensity,” said Farmer.
This was also the second strong Tryon finish for Avatar Real Estate LLC’s Dalliance; he was fifth on Friday.
“I was thrilled with all of them. Dalliance is a really good horse, and he just needs to hit the right stage where he gets famous once,” said Farmer. “He’s been knocking on the door for a while.”
Farmer tacked up her former derby and high performance hunter partner, Jessica Stitt’s 12-year-old Taken, for fourth. The horse usually contests the juniors now with Giavanna Rinaldi, but Farmer still competes him on special occasions.
“He’s entered at Devon [in the juniors],” she said. “I said, ‘I haven’t ridden my horse in so long over a real course.’ Every once in a while I jump him around at 3’6”. He’s fun to pull out of the barn. He owes me absolutely nothing, but it was fun to pull him out of the barn for this. He gave those young kids a run for their money.”
See full results online.
