USU Equestrian team prepares for semifinals

The Utah State western equestrian team will travel to Florida State University to compete in the semifinals of the Intercollegiate Horse Show Association starting March 24.

Boasting more than 8,300 students and more than 370 colleges and universities, IHSA gives students the opportunity to show off horsemanship as well as technical riding.

Horsemanship and reining are the two events that the USU Western team will participate in, and different events and levels are based on the riders’ experience. This seemingly simple and routine competition has a catch: USU students will ride horses they have never ridden before.

Jason Romney, coach of the team, said the riders draw horses from FSU’s stock and, with no warm-up or practice, begin the competition after five minutes.

“We just have to go in and show an unknown horse,” Romney said. “It evens the playing field a little bit. Most of the time no one has been on the horse they are competing on.”

The unique challenge of competing on a horse the rider has never ridden before adds a whole new degree of difficulty to competition on horses.

“The whole challenge is to adjust and adapt to the current situation,” Romney said. “To be really successful, you need to be able to ride and adapt and have a lot of feel on the horses so you can mentally and physically adapt to how the horse is acting — all the while someone is judging you.”

With semifinals weeks away, riders try to prepare for the challenge of riding an unknown horse.

“We prepare by having the students get on horses that they have not ridden a whole lot,” Romney said. “We have them ride a lot of different horses and ride at different places so they can learn to adapt.”

Of the 15-person team, three individuals stood out by qualifying for the semifinals on their own.

Kelsey Romney received an automatic bye into nationals by winning high-point rider in regional competition held February 18-19. Tina Willis and Marie Yamane also stood out individually.

Yamane, who started riding consistently two years ago when she joined the team, will compete in the horsemanship portion of the show.

“IHSA judges horsemanship based on how well you keep your frame, which is keeping your upper body up straight, heel in line, with your hips in line with your shoulder,” Yamane said. “The other part is keeping your shape while moving the horse where it needs to be with minimal amount of body movement.”

Yamane said the unusual circumstances of the competition provide an additional dimension to the basics of riding.

“In the two seconds you are walking out in the arena, before judging begins, I try to get a feel of the horse,” she said. “It is in those two seconds that you are mentally going through what you need to do.”

The Western Equestrian team members look to repeat last year by qualifying for nationals again.

“The team works really hard, and we are excited to go this year,” Yamane said.

– mega.bodi@aggiemail.usu.edu