Elenor the Barbie Dream Pony

The feisty Norwegian Fjord is our September Breed of the Month on YourDressage! Did you know that dressage riders who choose a registered Fjord as their dressage mount are eligible for special awards through the Adequan®/USDF All-Breeds Awards program? The Norwegian Fjord Horse Registry and the Norwegian Fjord Horse Alliance Inc. are participating organizations!

By Paige Poupart

My search for Elenor began less with knowing what I wanted and more with knowing what I didn’t want. 

After two decades of riding off-track Thoroughbreds (OTTBs), I was ready for something completely different. I wanted a drafty, pony-type horse with a more stoic personality. Something thoughtful. Smart and trainable, but without the seemingly endless energy and explosive reactions that I had experienced in so many of my OTTBs. 

I also finally accepted something I probably should have realized years earlier: I’m five feet tall, and I don’t need a giant, elegant, big-moving horse to pursue dressage. For years, I had tried to make those larger horses work for me. They were beautiful, but they could also be a lot of horse for my body. I finally decided I wanted something that fit me. 

I wanted the cute horse. 

Basically, I wanted a Barbie horse. 

At first, I was looking at Haflingers because they are a little more common in our area, and you see them more often in dressage. We also board and train at a show facility that specializes in importing German Riding Ponies from Europe, so we are constantly surrounded by these beautiful, fancy ponies who arrive by plane and go on to become wonderful mounts for adult amateur riders. 

Watching them actually helped me realize that I could pursue my dressage goals on a smaller horse. There was just one problem: the price. 

Many of those imported ponies easily cost six figures. With both my daughter and me riding dressage, spending that kind of money on a pony was never going to be realistic. So I knew I would have to find something young, probably unstarted, and train it myself. 

That part didn’t scare me. 

I just needed the right breed. 

I wanted something intelligent and sensible. Athletic, but not explosive. A horse that would think before reacting instead of deciding that a butterfly in the corner of the arena was a life-threatening emergency. 

Then I discovered Norwegian Fjords. 

I had been seeing these magical, zebra-looking horses dancing around Denmark on Instagram for months. The more I researched them, the more they seemed almost too good to be true. They are known for being incredibly intelligent, thoughtful rather than reactive, and incredibly willing to work. As a pony breed, they are also the perfect size for me. They are athletic enough to move well in the dressage ring, and allow me to look graceful in our dressage seat equitation classes. 

To me, Fjords were the epitome of the cute Barbie horse, and sported personality to the max. 

Then I found Elenor. 

She was four years old and newly started. She had no baggage, a solid pre-purchase exam, and a sporty dressage pedigree on both sides. Everything I had learned about the breed made sense when I looked at her. I didn’t need to test ride her. 

She was four. She had no history to overcome. I had done my research, liked what I saw, and trusted my gut. So I bought her sight unseen. 

It sounds completely impulsive because it was. But sometimes you just know. 

And somehow, that little four-year-old Fjord I bought on a gut feeling has ended up being one of the best decisions of my life. 

And that is where the story really gets interesting, because when I brought her home, my expectations were actually pretty modest. 

When I first got Elenor, my long-term goal was simply to make it to Training Level; that felt ambitious enough. 

I was coming from a lifetime in the hunter/jumper world and was still very new to dressage. The classical German dressage trainer at our barn would shout instructions across the arena, and half the time it sounded like another language. Sometimes it actually was another language. We didn’t always agree on the best way to train an off-breed, unique little horse like Elenor, but we always agreed on one thing: work ethic. 

To look back now and realize that in just two years we have gone from barely broken to Second Level is pretty remarkable. Elenor has completely changed my expectations of what she can do. I thought making it to Training Level, possibly doing some lower-level Working Equitation, and riding the trails behind our barn would be our limit.  

One of the things I find most interesting about training her is that she actually gets excited when she has something new to learn. I tend to be obsessive about the basics, and I want to stay there until everything is perfect before I move on. Elenor, however, has taught me that sometimes moving forward is what makes the basics better. 

If she gets bored with a movement, the work can start getting sloppy. But give her something harder— something that makes her use her brain and her body in a new way—and suddenly the things she already knows become better, too. She gets more engaged and more excited. She loves having a job. 

Last year, we were so excited to go to the Great American/USDF Regional Championships at Training Level. I remember thinking, Wow. We actually made it. I thought we had arrived. And then we got there and, for some completely mysterious reason, we couldn’t get our canter leads. 

We hadn’t had a problem with them in six months, but suddenly, they were gone. We came in last in our championship classes because she simply could not figure out how to pick up the correct lead. 

But that is part of horse training. You can do everything right and still have a weekend where your horse apparently forgets everything she has ever learned. 

We managed to roll out of Training Level with an Adequan®/USDF All-Breeds Champion Award from the Norwegian Fjord Horse Alliance, Inc and into First Level, where Test 3 is arguably one of the most technically demanding and canter-heavy tests of the lower national levels. We worked incredibly hard for the 63% qualifying score we needed to begin building our First Level Freestyle. After six test scores being stuck around 62%, I was starting to wonder if we were ever going to get there. 

Then we scored a 68%. And somehow, we went on to finish third overall at First Level at the National Dressage Pony Cup! 

I still think that is a little bit of a miracle for a horse like Elenor. Fjords simply aren’t built like the typical modern dressage horse, and the amount of canter required in that test is physically demanding, especially for them. 

So now our competition goal is to earn my Bronze Medal with Elenor. I have absolutely no doubt that we will get there. But, I also don’t want our entire partnership to be defined by what happens between the white letters and the arena rails. 

The life I want with Elenor is much bigger than that. 

I want to keep learning and moving up the levels, certainly. I want to see how far this little Fjord can take me, and I want to keep putting the Fjord name out there in places where people might not expect to see one. But I also want to trail ride with her, and do Working Equitation. I want to haul her somewhere new just because we can, and spend ordinary afternoons at the barn, hacking around, taking her for a walk, or doing absolutely nothing productive at all. 

Those moments matter just as much to me as the ribbons. 

I ride after work because I love it. Elenor is my hobby, my escape, and honestly, one of the best parts of my day. There is nothing quite like walking into the barn, seeing her face, and knowing that she is going to try her heart out for me. 

She may look like a Barbie pony, but when I ask her to work, she is my war horse, giving me everything she has. She loves the challenge, she loves learning, and she genuinely seems to love performing. 

That is what makes me most excited about whatever comes next. I don’t really know how far we can go anymore; I just know I want to keep going with her. 

And when our competition years eventually wind down, I want her to still be the horse I can throw a saddle on, point toward the trail, and spend an afternoon with. 

That, to me, is the real long-term goal: to build a partnership that lasts well beyond the show ring.