Horse & Hound
Blue Ridge Hunt Point-to-Point Moves To April, and Spring
This oil painting by Linda Volrath is a reminder of the cruel winds and sometimes worse weather that prevailed at the Blue Ridge Hunt point-to-point on that first weekend in March every year. With the new late-April race date, such days on this excellent viewing racecourse are now just a memory...it is sincerely hoped.The Blue Ridge Hunt’s point-to-point course at Woodley has long been one of the favorite venues for race watching as far as view ability of the races are concerned. But the early March date on the Woodley hillside has had an equally long history of unforgettably uncomfortable weather, as Linda Volrath’s wonderful painting reminds us. The hunt’s new April date, which fell this year on Sunday, the 22nd, promises now to substantially improve the comfort aspect of the equation for viewers and participants alike. This year, it was a picture-perfect day for both horses and people, and a new look greeted spectators with vendor and sponsor tents, a food stand, stick pony races for the children, spring temperatures, and blessed sunshine.
Loudoun Hunt Point-to-Point Races
(Center) Greg Ryan's Three Kingdoms (Kieran Norris up) won the Open Hurdle Race. / Lesley & David Hower photoLoudoun Hunt opened a day of point-to-point racing at Oatlands Plantation in Leesburg, Virginia on Sunday, April 15, 2018, with two exhibition side saddle races—one over fences, the other on the flat. King of Hearts trained by George Kuk and ridden by Devon Zebrovious was the winner over fences. The sixteen-yerar-old bay gelding alternated the lead with Little Lady, Amy Jo McGee up, in the two-horse field and prevailed in the stretch.
Hail Yeah was the winner by a neck in the Side Saddle Flat race in a field of seven. Winning owner was Terri Ehrenfeld, and Kathryn Cowles was trainer and rider.
The Stop
{loadposition thestop} Mouseover image and click play to view the entire sequence. / Douglas Lees photoEclipse Award winning photographer Douglas Lees shot this harrowing sequence of Elizabeth Scully when her horse Girlsruletheworld refused near the officials’ stand at the Piedmont Point-to-Point Races on March 24, 2018. The incident occurred nearly in front of Alexandra McKee on Alert N Ready, that pair making an amazing adjustment to avoid a pileup, get over the fence, and finish the race. The sequence is all the more dramatic for Scully’s calm demeanor on her way to the turf contrasted with the electrified expressions on the faces of the officials. Scully and Girlsruletheworld won the Restricted Young Adult Flat Race at the Blue Ridge Point-to-Point in 2016 and were a competitive combination in the 2017 Lady Rider Timber point-to-points. McKee is a past winner of the Grand National Steeplechase on Narrow River in 2003 and placed second in the 2004 Maryland Hunt Cup behind Blair Waterman on Bug River. Lees used a Nikon D5 camera body with a Nikon 70-200 mm lens for the shots. Posted April 22, 2018
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Performance Trial a Home Run at Mission Valley
"Don’t like hobbles and I can’t stand fences; Don’t fence me in!" A song that could have been written in the tallgrass prairie of Kansas. / Julie Honsinger photo
The MFHA Hark Forward Performance Trial Series took participants to the prairies of middle America, a unique experience. I love the traditional hunt countries on the East Coast with large forests and big open fields, and I also love the totally different experiences of hunting in land where it is so wide open you can literally see for miles in every direction. Here, in the wide open expanse of the Kansas prairie, field members get to see most all of the hound work.
Mission Valley Hunt (KS) hosted this Foxhound Performance Trial over the weekend of March 2–4, 2018. Five hunts from the Midwest competed. In addition to Mission Valley, hounds were entered from Bridlespur Hunt (MO), Fort Leavenworth Hunt (KS), Mill Creek Hunt (IL), and North Hills Hunt (NE). Guest huntsman was Angela Murray, MFH, Red Rock Hounds (NV).
Old Dominion Point-to-Point at Ben Venue
Trained and ridden by Amber Hodyka, Manacor returns to the races as a timber horse, and wins. / Douglas Lees photoManacor is back. Remade into a timber horse and now trained and ridden by Amber Hodyka, Manacor won the first race, Lady Timber, at the Old Dominion Hounds Point-to-Point Races on Saturday, April 7, 2018.
The bay ten-year-old was brought to the U.S. from Ireland by trainer Jimmy Day and was a frequent winner over hurdles out of Daybreak Stables for four years. He disappeared from the point-to-points last year and is back in the capable hands of Hodyka, a friend of the Days.
Manacor led throughout most of the race, held off a bid by Erin Swope’s Sweet Talking Guy, and won comfortably. Sweet Talking Guy—another familiar horse on the point-to-point circuit with a regular habit of winning Lady Timber races—was one of the top six Leading Horses in Virginia in 2017. Just off a Lady Timber win at Piedmont this season, he came up short against Manacor.
Hillsboro Four-Times Champion at Southern Hound Show
Hillsboro Walnut 2017 (Hillsboro William 2013 ex their Sable 2013) is Grand Champion of the 2018 Southern Hound Show. (L-R): Hillsboro huntsman John Gray, whipper-in Leilani Gray, Orrin Ingram, MFH, and Lee Ann Ingram / Leslie Shepherd photoThe twelfth Southern Hound Show, hosted annually by the Live Oak Hounds (FL), will be remembered for the rain and the Hillsboro Hounds (TN) entries that swept four of the five Championship classes.
Hillsboro Walnut 2017 was judged Grand Champion of Show and Champion Bi*ch. Hillsboro hounds also won the Champion Unentered and Champion Two-Couple classes. Live Oak Assault was Champion Dog Hound and Reserve Champion of Show. “For Hillsboro to win all but one of the championships is a major accomplishment for Master Orrin Ingram and Huntsman Johnny Gray,” said Daphne Wood, MFH, Live Oak Hounds.
March Madness Joint Meet with Bull Run and Farmington
Retired Bull Run huntsman Greg Schwartz leads the second flight. / Elizabeth H. Sutton photoFarmington Hunt's participation in March Madness Week at Bull Run Hunt started with a lot of questions. Hounds had not hunted in a week. Would they be up to the task of more open country and multiple game—fox and coyote? Did they have what it takes to give the sporting Bull Run field and their March Madness visitors a good day’s hunting? Would renegades riot?
These questions nagged at some of the Farmington Hunt members and staff as we assembled at Horseshoe Farm in Rapidan, Virginia with twelve-and-a-half couple and a good gang of members. Three huntsmen and former huntsmen from further north said to me, “Well, you all will have to up your game today,” as we kidded about the lack of action that had been experienced on the three previous days due primarily to the weather.
Fout-Norris Dominate at Orange County
With four wins and two seconds of ten races on the card, Kieran Norris was leading rider at Orange County. / Douglas Lees photoKieran Norris had an outstanding day on the racecourse at beautiful Locust Hill Farm—timber, hurdle, flat—whichever course he rode. Norris, Virginia’s Leading Rider in 2017, rode four winners at the Orange County Point-to-Point on Saturday, April 1, 2018. He finished the day with two seconds as well, making it first or second in six of the ten races run.
Entries were reasonably strong, with the Maiden Flat and the Maiden Hurdle Races being split. Trainer Doug Fout saddled four winners as well, three of them with Norris aboard.
The County Limerick Foxhounds at Kilmallock
The well-bred Old English foxhounds of the County Limerick continue to show exciting sport. The Limerick breeding program has been closely associated with that of the Belvoir (UK) since the Mastership of Lord Daresbury beginning in the mid-twentieth century. / Catherine Power photo
Reports on hunting with The Counties, as the County Limerick Foxhounds are locally referred to, have been glowing with stories of one red letter day following hard on the heels of another. So it was with some sense of anticipation we joined last Saturday’s meet at the mart yard in Kilmallock.
There were over sixty mounted, including several U.S. visitors. From the Midland Fox Hounds in Georgia came Mason Lampton, Jr, MFH, with his two sons Whitney and younger brother Henry—great-grandchildren of the famous foxhunter, Ben Hardaway, who at age ninety-eight passed away only recently. Organizers of the American expedition were Richard and Lilith Boucher, steeplechase jockey and trainer from Camden, South Carolina, and their daughter Mell.
Timber Horses Show Up to Race at Piedmont
Teddy Davies, shown between (l-r) father Joe Davies and grandfather Bruce Miller, won two pony races. Trainer Joe Davies is a Maryland Hunt Cup winning rider. Trainer Bruce Miller is ex- MFH of Mr. Stewart's Cheshire Foxhounds (PA) / Douglas Lees photoTwo of the four timber races at the Piedmont Point-to-Point on Saturday, March 24, 2018, were split, giving race goers six well-filled and exciting races over the beautiful timber course at Salem. Turf conditions were good.
Dakota Slew, a multi-winning timber horse was back. Slew had the honor of retiring the Rokeby Bowl here two years ago after his third consecutive Open Timber win at Piedmont. Still trained by Richard Valentine, the old favorite that for a time practically “owned” the course settled for a second place finish under McLane Hendricks in the first division of the Amateur/Novice Rider Timber Race.
