Southeast Missouri State University student publication

Southeast equestrian team begins new season

Tuesday, September 23, 2014
Members of the equestrian team at the Red vs. Black show at the Remley Equestrian Center.

The Southeast Missouri State Redhawks equestrian team held a mock show on Saturday to start off the 2014-2015 season.

The show was held at Remley Equestrian Center in Cape Girardeau. The center is owned by SuAnne Remley, the team's coach.

Saturday's show, called Red vs. Black, was a practice show to prepare the team for the upcoming season. It also gives new team members who have never participated in a show before a good idea of what to expect.

"It's a good opportunity for anyone who's interested or doesn't know a lot about the team to come out and see what we do," team member Ashley Mann said.

The show focused on two different types of riding styles: hunt seat and Western. In hunt seat, horses do jumps, a walk, a trot and a canter. Western style is slower and the horses only do a walk, a jog and a lope.

"It's more showing off your horsemanship and how well you can maneuver that horse," team president Alison Fischbeck said.

The equestrian team did not compete in Western style shows before last season. The style was just introduced to the team a year ago and has drawn many new members to the team.

"Western is slower and it's not as intimidating as the hunt if you've never done it before," Fischbeck said.

This season the team will compete in four hunt shows and five Western shows.

Hunt and Western styles each have different levels of competition. The first level of hunt seat is beginner, which includes walk and trot. There are also intermediate and advanced levels, which add a canter. Novice, intermediate and open levels of competition include jumping the horses.

The same applies for Western, but does not include jumping. Novice, intermediate and open for Western style instead include reining. In reining, the rider guides the horse through a series of patterns of circles and spins.

The Redhawks equestrian team has members in every division of hunt seat. With western having just been added, the team does not yet have members in each division of that style.

Only members of the Southeast team participated in the Red vs. Black practice show, but the team normally competes against other schools under an organization called the Intercollegiate Horse Show Association. The team's first IHSA show will be held at Truman State University in Kirksville, Missouri, on Friday.

Three members of the team qualified for regionals last year. Those riders were Katie Amrhein for walk/trot/canter, Michaela Ramey for walk/trot and Megan Smith for walk/trot/canter.

The team is supported by the members and sponsors, but is not funded by the Southeast athletic department.

Anyone interested in joining the equestrian team can join at any time and team meetings are held every Wednesday at noon in room 127 of Dempster Hall.

Lessons are offered for new riders which cost $25 for the first lesson and the cost goes down to $15 after the first week of lessons. Equipment can be borrowed from the team for these lessons at the home barn.

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