Untacked

C H R O N O F H O R S E . C O M JA N UA R Y/ F E B R UA R Y 2 017 6 9 Why Not? Way back in 1997, I was a junior at Averett University (then College) in Virginia, and conversations between the French and Virginia Tourism board led to a team from Averett traveling to France, training for a week in TREC with the sport's originators, and then competing in the world championships in Saint-Pierre-d'Albigny. My big accomplishment there was nailing my mount's shoe back on about halfway through the POR—while I was lost—using a fence tool as a hammer, and clinchers and duct tape to cover the sharp edges. We found our way and finished sound, with all four shoes, and the French farrier was impressed with my work. Our team completed the event upright, intact and smiling. We brought TREC back to the United States, putting on a clinic and a small TREC event the following year. Our team leader and college riding program director at the time, Mary Harcourt, planted the seed of TREC in her home state of North Carolina and kept it watered, and since then many others have discovered the sport and become competitors, ambassadors and officials. Nineteen years later, TREC USA has a dedicated group of members based mainly in North Carolina and Virginia who train and compete in local and regional events. Every four years or so, TREC USA organizes a team for the world championships, and they find suitable horses to lease, organize training and housing, and then compete. e U.S. team is usually the only one with leased horses, making us the underdogs. Mary reached out to me in late March of this year, wondering if I'd be interested in doing TREC again. I'd never been to Spain and hadn't had the pants scared off me in a few years, so of course I said I'd consider it. Just to be sure I still enjoyed the sport, I took my mom's Belgian-Quarter Horse mare, Honey, to a spring training weekend in Virginia with Kim Stoddard, TREC USA President and our eventual team chef d'equipe. Within a few hours, the map reading and pace adjustment came back to me, and I was hooked. Spain it would be. I hiked with maps for the next several months to prepare for the orienteering, and I participated in conference calls to select our horses, housing and other details. In late August, a week ahead of our competition start, I arrived in Madrid with one suitcase full of clothing and another full of American-themed team gifts (read: bourbon, because I live in Kentucky) and riding gear for the event. For the POR phase, riders are required to carry everything from a headlamp and halter to a first-aid kit and hoof boot, so it was a lot of stuff, some of it a bit random. For example, I had no idea what breed or size horse I'd be riding, so I selected a mid- range boot size and hoped for the best. "We stood on cobblestones in the shadow of the Roman aqueduct, listened to speeches in several languages, and watched traditional musicians and dancers perform," said Stephanie Church (right, on Marinus, with Paula Nelson on Ideal) of the TREC World Championships' opening ceremony, which took place at the Aqueduct of Segovia. PHOTO COURTESY OF TREC-USA

• Cover