Patience pays off for this talented young rider.

Brian Hafner didn’t get into dressage for the instant gratification. At 14 years old he knew he’d found his passion and convinced his parents to buy a young horse for him. Six years later that investment is finally paying off with big wins at the Dressage Affaire CDI-W in Del Mar, Calif., March 12-15.

Hafner took home blue in the FEI Young Rider Team test (66.63%) and the Individual test (67.21%) with Lombardo LHF. It was only the second time he’d competed in a CDI, and the pair stepped out at Prix St. Georges for the first time in January.

Horses were always a part of Hafner’s childhood. “We have 40 acres and a hobby farm in the Midwest,” he said. “My first horse was an Arab-Welsh cross. It was kind of off and on riding as a young kid. My parents were really reluctant to buy me a real dressage horse. They didn’t think I’d stick with it.”

But it was pretty clear Hafner was determined. He helped pay for dressage lessons by picking rocks out the arena at a local boarding facility and then graduated to cleaning stalls.

“I’d have to be there at 5 a.m. to clean stalls, much to my parents’ distress because they’d have to get up, drive me to the barn and drop me off that early,” recalled Hafner.

Although many teenage boys might have dropped riding or gone for a more action-packed discipline like jumping, Hafner appreciated the challenge of dressage.

“Every day you have a different horse. They have their lows and highs just like the riders have lows and highs. It’s all about the details, and that’s a challenge for me. I like to take that on,” he said.

Hafner’s first big challenge was finding a horse he could ride up the levels. He bought Lombardo as a 4-year-old in 2003 from Michelle Lauber in Colorado. The Hanoverian gelding (Londonderry—Waluga) was young but
talented.

“Money was an issue at the time. We chose to get a high-quality youngster rather than an average-quality made horse. That’s starting to pay off. We went for the long-term gain I would get from training my own horse,” said Hafner. “It would’ve been a lot easier for me to go out and buy a Prix St. Georges horse and compete. But this way I’ve gotten to learn about training the horse and connecting with the horse.”

Hafner had his eyes opened to the bigger dressage world when his parents briefly moved from Minnesota to California for a job. “All the Olympic riders and top trainers in this small area drew me back. The Midwest has some dressage, but it’s nothing like the dressage world here in Southern California,” he said.

So Hafner applied to the California State University at San Marcos and packed up Lombardo. He found trainer Laurie Falvo Doyle at the Dove Hollow Dressage Center in Olivenhain, Calif., and soon settled in as working student and part-time college student.

“It’s been great. I’ve gotten to sit on tons of different horses and used that to help me with my horse. It’s hard trying to go to school and be a working student and make it work financially, but it’s what I have to do to make my dreams come true with what I want to do in riding,” he said.

Hafner, 20, is pursing a business degree, which he hopes will either help him when he starts his own dressage business or will give him a fallback if horses don’t work out.

For now he’s focused on horses. His goal this year is to ride in the North American Junior and Young Rider Championships, and his wins from the Dressage Affaire should help with that.

“My first CDI was Burbank [Calif.], and it went well, but we did have some issues in both of the tests that we rode. That was only his second show at the Prix St. Georges level. He was a little tight and tense,” said Hafner. “I wasn’t planning on going to the Dressage Affaire, but I felt like I needed to get down [the] centerline more and get my horse more comfortable in the ring.”

He chose not to submit his scores from Burbank, but the show at Del Mar was a big improvement.

“I was super happy with the team test. He felt better to me the first day. He was really forward and soft all around. We had some small issues. The changes could have been better, but it was a very clean and accurate test,” said Hafner. “The second day he felt a little more tired, which is normal. Because of that, he was a little more tense. We had one bobble in the four-tempis, but otherwise it was a clean test. That’s what I was trying to do at this show.”

Hafner said he was nervous after the first CDI because it hadn’t gone as well as he hoped. “This show eased my mind and let me know that we can go out there and be competitive. I have high hopes for the Del Mar National horse show. I’m hoping we can be competitive with the really good riders that they have in Region 7 and make the team,” he said.

Peters Monopolizes The Grand Prix Wins

No one was surprised to see Steffen Peters win the Grand Prix (76.00%) and Grand Prix freestyle (79.95%) with Ravel at the Dressage Affaire CDI-W, but it turned out his biggest competitor was himself. Peters finished second in the Grand Prix with Orion (71.31%), a horse Canadian Leslie Reid trained and took to the 2008 Olympic Games, and Orion went on to win the Grand Prix Special (70.20%).

Peters, San Diego, Calif., was understandably pleased with both horses, especially Ravel. “Any time you break your own record in the Grand Prix and then break a U.S. record in the freestyle, that’s always a good day in the office,” he said.

That freestyle score also clinched his place as the top-seeded North American rider for the Rolex FEI World Cup Final in Las Vegas, Nev.

“The freestyle was one of the best he’s done,” said Peters. “I changed the timing of the choreography a little bit to make it match each footfall more. It wasn’t that far from 100 percent before, but I really feel like I don’t have to adjust anywhere. I can just ride his tempo, and the music underlines every footfall.”

He also replaced the Asian-themed music in the trotwork—which he’d chosen for the Olympic Games in Hong Kong—with Coldplay’s “Viva La Vida.”

“If you listen to the lyrics of ‘Viva La Vida,’ it’s quite dark, and [Ravel’s owner Akiko Yamazaki] was concerned that people might read a little too much into it. But ‘Sympathy For The Devil’ [which is another song in the freestyle] doesn’t have the most uplifting lyrics either,” said Peters. “The melody was great, and it fits really well. This is exactly the version I’m going to try in Vegas.”

Orion came into Peters’ barn after the Olympic Games to be sold. Peters rode the 13-year-old Dutch Warmblood (Jazz—Havana) in the November Del Mar show for schooling and decided he was going well enough to enter the CDI in March.

“Leslie did a wonderful job with him. He’s very solid in all of his movements. I don’t remember riding a horse who can do flying changes as straight as he does. There’s absolutely no swinging in them, and that says a lot about his training,” said Peters. “I like to put a horse in the show arena that I’m trying to sell. At the end of the day the numbers don’t lie. I certainly think he could make a wonderful team horse. Any time a Grand Prix horse is solid and can get into the 70 percent, that is certainly a very good asset for any country.”