“It’s all about trust between the horse and the rider,” said Lynette Cordell as she and her daughter watched another 4-H gamer try to urge her mount through a path flanked by six posts, three on either side. The young girl’s horse had stopped just short of the entrance and was shifting nervously from one foot to the other. “Some horses don’t think they can fit through it,” Cordell explained. “This is where the trust comes in. The horse has to be able to trust where the rider is leading it.” The object of this game, called key hole, was to gallop between the posts, turn around and gallup back as fast as possible. It was one of many events for young horse riders at the Wright County Fair in Howard Lake last week. The fair, which ran from Wednesday, July 30, until Sunday, Aug. 3, drew 4-H members from across the county to enter their animals, projects, crafts and skills into competition for red, blue and white ribbons and the possibility of qualifying to compete in the Minnesota State Fair in September. “I just do it for fun,” said 2003 Annandale graduate Annie Imholte. She is a member of the Far Side 4-H club and has been competing with her horse, Belle, in the Wright County Fair for the last three years. She competes in the games section of the program, which includes barrel racing, key hole, jumping figure eights and egg and spoon, a game which tests the riders’ grace on the horse by seeing how long they can balance an egg on a spoon while they first walk, then trot, then gallup their horse around the show ring. It’s not your average high school sport, but Imholte and her friends enjoy it. For the five days of the fair they can be found camped out in a horse trailer on the grounds. They spend the week eating fair food – cheese curds, jerky and all you can drink milk for 50 cents – and riding horses. “I’ve always been an animal freak,” said Imholte, who got Belle for Christmas five years ago and has been riding ever since. She does four or five shows a summer in addition to the county fair. A number of them are through the Clearwater Silver Bullet Saddle Club. She is what riders call a gamer, though she says she is not as hard core as other competitors in the area. She begins training with Belle in the early summer, though it’s more of a brush up for the 23-year-old mare, who already understood the basics of gaming when Imholte met her. Though a novice to the sport when she started three years ago, Imholte learned a lot from her cousins, the Romine family of Annandale, who had been involved in the sport for a long time, and the rest she gleaned from magazines. “Once you get started it’s just a matter of developing your own technique,” said Imholte, who took home a handful of blue and red ribbons for her efforts Sunday. But gaming isn’t the only option for horses and their riders at the fair. Angela Cordell, an Annandale senior and member of the Far Side group, competes in the Saddle Seat, or Pleasure Riding category. Two of the subgroups are English and western. The difference in the two is the equipment used and how a rider sits in the saddle, Lynette said. Competitors are judged on how well trained their horse is, how it reacts to commands and how smooth their ride is. Three years ago Angela qualified for the State Fair and was the first Far Side member to do so. This year she won Grand Champion Thoroughbred in the halter class despite a fall that sent her to the hospital on the opening night of the fair. Things weren’t looking good for Angela Wednesday evening when a foreign object in the exercise ring spooked her horse, Breeze, who reared and threw her onto the ground. She was taken by ambulance to the emergency room where she was treated for abrasions across her face. On Thursday she was still too sore to compete but planned on riding her sister’s horse in Saturday’s events. Breeze wasn’t hurt and even received forgiving pats from her owner and a few peppermints, her favorite treat. “I’ll get back on her before the fair is over,” Angela had said Thursday with determination. “It takes a brave girl to get back on a horse like that,” said Far Side team leader Joelle Arlt. The Far Side 4-H club includes approximately 15 Annandale area youths. Annandale eighth-grader Jaclyn Thorston is another new face to the horse competitions at the Wright County Fair. This is only her second year showing her mare, Ruby, and her first year in Howard Lake. Already she has qualified three times for the State Fair. She participated last year and this summer will return after qualifying in the Western Saddle Club Association open class in the English and Western categories. Unlike the 4-H class, open class invites anyone, any age, to compete. Last week in Howard Lake she again qualified for state, this time through 4-H. By Saturday night, the door of Ruby’s stall was gleaming with an assortment of red, blue and one white ribbon, a testament to Thorston and Ruby’s compatibility. And compatibility is what makes a rider and horse pair successful. “Jaclyn and Ruby click,” Lynette said describing the way she encourages her mount through a subtle combination of hand and voice commands. “If the rider and the horse don’t click, it won’t work. It’s all about trust.”
