Heavy Hitters! Throughout the month of December, we are featuring heavy breeds and heavy breed crosses!
Did you know that dressage riders who choose a heavy hitter as their mounts are eligible for special awards through the Adequan®/USDF All-Breeds Awards program, as the Draft Cross Breeders & Owners Association (among several others!) is a participating organization!
Here, a Region 8 adult amateur shares the story of the three-year-old rescue mare who won her heart, and has become her greatest partner in both dance and life!
By Ellie Miles
Calypso (or Caly for short) is a ten-year-old Percheron/Paint cross mare whom I adopted from the Massachusetts SPCA in 2019 while working there.
I had all but given up on horse shopping after losing my two-year-old KWPN “dream horse” to lymphoma two years prior, and then subsequently suffering a bad fall off a training horse in 2018. I came from a hunter/jumper background, but at that point, I just wanted something safe and sane.
And then, Caly arrived on a cold January day, with a body score of 1.5, at just three years old. At first, I was hesitant to believe she was as calm, cool, and collected as she seemed. She had been starved nearly to death after all, and her bloodwork showed she was anemic. But, as she began to recover, her personality only brightened, while her confidence and kindness remained the same.
So, she came home with me in March 2019.
We were slowly able to piece together Caly’s past. She had been bred by a caring couple in Virginia, and sold as a yearling to an amazing home with owners who worked on versatility, in-hand trail, and ground driving. That family fell on unexpected hardship, though, and sold Caly to a woman in Massachusetts as a two-year-old.
By three years of age, she had passed through three homes and a rescue before landing with me. A rough start to life, but having had to adapt over and over at such a formative age is something I credit for her ability to “just go with it”.
As I mentioned, I was a hunter/jumper, and this drafty mare with the head and shoulders of a Percheron and the backend of a grade horse was not going to be my National Derby star. She became so much more.
We enjoyed our first few years together learning the basics of under-saddle work, and I even taught her how to drive (a feat that would not have been possible without the close oversight and friendship of Sonia Williams, given I had no driving background).
In 2023, I fell on my own hardship, struggling with a mental health battle, and while I decided to take a step back from riding, I knew Caly was far too special to sell. I leased her to a local dressage trainer for her lesson program, where Calypso began to show her propensity for dance.
By early 2024, I was feeling in a place where I was taking better care of myself and of my partnership with Calypso. With Caly back home, we partnered with Jessica Freiman to learn dressage together. We would trailer over for a lesson once a month, do our homework, and go back for more.
We made our debut at Training Level at a State of Maine Dressage Association (SMDA) schooling show that spring, followed by our first USDF-Recognized show doing Training Level Test 3 and First Level Test 1. Calypso continued to show off her steady demeanor at every showgrounds, in any weather, and with every ride. She was unflappable. That consistency earned us our very first SMDA Year End Award: 2024 Reserve Champion Adult Amateur at Training Level.
As we turned to this year, we hit the stage in our training where it was no longer the basics of flatwork. The step up to Second Level would involve movements, collection, and form that neither of us had ever tackled. We started lessoning weekly and continued to grow. Caly seemingly enjoyed the more difficult work that was being asked of her, and how much praise and attention she would receive when we got it right.
This year, we showed First Level Test 3 and Second Level Test 1, earning two-thirds of the scores necessary for my USDF Bronze Medal, which has now become a short-term goal rather than a pipe dream.
Calypso’s training regime takes advantage of that unbeatable brain of hers. She can be found driving one day, on the beach conditioning the next, and in Jessica’s arena for an upper-level lesson the following day. It keeps both of our brains happy, and her fit as a fiddle. My confidence in our partnership has pushed me beyond the horsewoman I ever thought I could be as an adult amateur – even taking on our first hunter pace this fall! She’s simply the most workmanlike, rideable, and focused horse I have ever had the pleasure of working with in my over 25 years around horses.
I think that in many ways, I fell into the stereotypical trap we have about “heavy hitters” when I first met Calypso. I thought that she’d be a nice all-arounder for someone, but not a competitor. And man, has she proved me wrong every “enter at A, X halt, salute” of the way. She also takes me back to the root of why we all start this crazy journey as riders: the love of horses and the fun and freedom they gift us.
I am so fortunate to have a partner who makes me a better rider every day, but one I can also trust implicitly. We are a team, and I wouldn’t want to dance through these tests, or life, with any other.
