Owner of Steepleview Farm, Walter Kunz, handed out (the best) ribbons,
photo courtesy of Maria Filsinger, MF Photography
Steepleview Farm held their inaugural horse trial last weekend. It is a farm of over 80 acres owned by Walter and Jean Kunz and located about 30 minutes west of Minneapolis, MN. Walter and Jean have worked tirelessly for two years to prepare to hold this event.
A couple years ago, Trott Brook Horse Trials held their last event which was located about 30 minutes north of the Twin Cities. Because of this, Walter and Jean decided to host a horse trials on their farm. They bought all of the portable BN-T xc fences from Trott Brook, invested in a fabulous water complex, and enlisted the best of the best to put the show together. Sherri Westphal has been the Kunz’s right hand woman throughout the process. There’s nothing she didn’t do. Sponsorship, xc course decorations, stall chart, prizes, all Sherri.
Val Rosha was the hard working secretary at the event, and was super friendly with everything. She went out of her way to make sure each and every competitor knew what was going on, where everything was, and catered to any questions they had.
Their first event ran smoothly, as best as you can expect. Everything was well labeled as to where warm ups and vendors were etc. The dressage was on grass next to a cemetery and the county road. Lots to look at. The footing on the cross country was notably hard. However, it rained Friday night which made it absolutely perfect. The xc course itself was straight-forward fence by fence. Nothing was super maxed out, there weren’t really any super technical questions. The xc paces were on the lowest end (420mpm for training). However, I thought the xc courses lacked a flow. You couldn’t really get in to a rhythm. It caught most of the competitor’s off guard and there were lots of refusals and eliminations across the board.
The show jumping was held next to the dressage area on Sunday. It was a good test of a course. Nice looking fences, but not a hunter course. I like to keep things interesting in the show jumping. I almost fell off over the second to last and last fence. I was clinging to my horse’s neck as I crossed the finish line, and all I could think of was Christine Bates and her winning sj round in Sydney. (Thanks ESJ!) I managed to stay on, and I’m pretty sure I can thank EN karma for that. So, remember kids, when you’re in peril, think of EN and it will all be okay.
A shout out to Ashley Keller for winning the Training Rider division. She’s a huge fan of EN, and after a not so stellar sj round at Richland, put in a near perfect round to finish on her dressage score and take the win.
Ann Bower won the Open Training division on her super ridiculously fancy (yes, that’s the proper terminology) horse, Prospero, finishing on their dressage score.
Laurie Beall came in first and second in her novice division. Brava to her!
Deb Stern picked up another win in her Novice division. She’s been winning everything left and right.
Sue Goepfert is an avid reader of Eventing Nation, and kindly took a video of me on the xc to post here on EN. However, it’s on my phone, and uploading it isn’t working out so well. However, Sue posted a video of the OT division winner Ann Bower. Thank you Sue!
Go Steepleview.
