Sixteen-year-old Fiona Lempres has not been eventing for long, but she’s already embraces the sport’s ups and downs. At the Kick-Off Horse Trials, for example, she had two highs and one low.
Fiona and Hathaway Royale won their first outing together – at Novice, and she and MHS Brown Jack were tied for 2nd in their first try at Training. Fiona and her third horse, Ogue Verdi, however, parted company while navigating Novice cross-country.
She believes in the eventing credo that when you’re not winning, you’re learning. The incident with “Ogre” was immediately put in the learning category. “I know exactly what I did wrong and I can learn from it.”
Fiona was first exposed to horses at her grandmother’s home in Pennsylvania. As a young girl, she’d ask her mom for lessons every time they visited. When Stephanie Lempres said yes, Fiona headed to Spring Down Equestrian Center near her home in the Peninsula area’s Atherton.
Vaulting Into Eventing
At 10, she started vaulting, first with the Woodside Vaulters, then with a team based at Webb Ranch in Portola Valley.
The vaulting foundation has been a big help, Fiona explains. “Learning to move with the horse in so many different positions has really helped my riding. Even if the horse moves in a funny way or takes a misstep, you learn to stick on there and help them move through that patch.”
After a few years of vaulting, Fiona switched to eventing and says, “I’m incredibly happy that I did.”
“I love the combination of discipline and skill, and also the adrenaline,” she explains. “There are so many different pathways you can take with it, and you learn so much with each phase. That has been so beneficial to me.”
Fiona is also grateful for the solid eventing base she got with Tori Traube of Bayville Eventing. Last summer, she moved to Avon Eventing, working with Mickayla Howard and Kendra Mitchell and fitting in well with Avon’s big group of young riders. A bonus is the fact that her former vaulting coach, Samantha Van Dyke, is now a full-time groom for Avon Eventing.
Three Is The Magic Number
Fiona came to Avon Eventing without a horse to compete. Her first horse, Cooley SOS, was rehabbing from an injury, so Fiona and Mickayla went horse shopping in Europe with Mike and Emma Winter.
They were only looking for one horse but wound up with three.
Meeting MHS Brown Jack came with the opportunity to meet world #1 eventer Tom McEwen in England. Over several years, Tom had taken the now 11-year-old Irish Sport Horse up to the CCI4*-L level. Fiona is grateful Jack didn’t seem to be a potential 4*-L or 5* superstar, because that meant he became available to teach her the ropes.
“Jack was one of the first horses I sat on in Europe, and Tom gave me such great insights. And I think Tom was interested to see how Jack went with someone who is not the world’s #1 rider!”
Fiona is 5’5” tall and Jack is 17.2 hands, and she’s enjoying the process of learning to partner with him. “Because he had such a great education with Tom, Jack has so much to teach me.”
Fiona, Tom and Jack reconnected recently during Tom’s clinic at Galway Downs in late January. “I was nervous because he gave me such an amazing horse and I wanted to show him that we had been taking great care of him,” Fiona says.
In the swirl of the clinic’s first day, Tom didn’t immediately recognize Jack. “But when he did, he was so happy to see him and Jack recognized him, I know. He was giving him all the cuddles, looking for treats and had his ears pricked forward.”
“Tom was so kind during the clinic and it was great to have his insights,” Fiona said of her quickly-settled nerves before riding in front of Tom for three days. “He gave me a lot of ideas for helping when Jack gets strong and strung out on the flat. And we talked about how he’s the most rideable and easy and nice on cross-country.”
Purchased last September, Jack and Ogre arrived Stateside in mid-October of last year. Ogre is the least experienced of the three. “He’s a very smart horse, but he gets quite grouchy when you do something wrong. Which is what happened with our fall during the Horse Trials.”
Another relatively seasoned horse with 3* mileage in Europe, Lizzy arrived in November. “She is the scrappy girl,” Fiona shares. “She has a small stride, but she’s very forward. It makes her amazing to ride and to see those distances on.”
As for goals this year, Fiona hopes to enter and complete her first FEI competition. Most importantly, however, is moving forward and up the divisions as it becomes appropriate with each horse. “I want to go as far as they’ll take me.”
Frequent Flier
Fiona is a sophomore at Sacred Heart Preparatory School in Atherton. Her horses spend most of the year at Avon Eventing’s base at Webb Ranch in Portola Valley. The Avon crew is wintering at KingsWay Ranch, right across the street from Galway Downs, so Fiona flies south on Friday nights and back north for school on Monday nights.
She’s grateful to her school for being flexible and to close friends who help her stay on track with assignments. While she’s at home without her horses, she catches up on schoolwork.
It’s also her time to emphasize physical therapy exercises that help her stay strong and pain-free in the saddle, despite having scoliosis. An abnormal sideways curvature of the spine, scoliosis presents an extra challenge for riders. She’s among a growing group of eventers to invest proactively in their fitness to be strong, effective and physically comfortable in the saddle.
While riding at KingsWay, Fiona and her fellow Avon Eventing young riders get frequent chances to watch, interact with and sometimes lesson with Tamie Smith, who’s based there. “I look up to them all so much,” Fiona says of Tamie, Tamie’s daughter Kaylawna Smith-Cook and the many professionals who visit for tune-ups.
“It’s such an honor to have a lesson with Tamie and even just to run into her on the property.” The feeling of awe reminds Fiona how she felt about her current trainers Mickayla Howard and Kendra Mitchell when she first saw them riding and coaching students.
“I always remember seeing Mickayla coaching young riders jumping around in the arena and it seemed like they were jumping the moon! She and Kendra are amazing coaches and I’m really grateful to have them.”
“It’s also amazing to be riding with so many people my age,” Fiona continues. “Most have been doing it a fair bit longer than me, so I have great opportunities to see what’s possible. And we all have a great time together.”
Fiona expects the International Horse Trials at the end of March will mark the end of her horses’ winter stay in Southern California. But no doubt she’ll return regularly, as she and horses pursue their horsemanship and competition goals.
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