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Brown equestrian: they're 'that good'

Most Brown students see more busy streets and tall buildings than open pastures and musty barns. But 33 Brown women see both. They're usually on campus, but twice a week they escape to a farm in Warren, Rhode Island.

The equestrian team drives 20 minutes in the team van to practice at Windswept Farm, rocking out to a team mix tape along the way.

"If I'm stressed out or whatever, if I'm having a bad week, I can just go out to the barn," said rider Jennifer Grover '10.

The team goes to the barn year-round, but only competes in the fall and spring.

Last Friday, the team finished first at a show hosted by Johnson and Wales, the last show of the regular season. The team has high hopes going into the Region 1 Championship on March 28, the first step in what team members hope will be a trip to Nationals for the third year in a row.

"Hopefully we'll win the region - unless something goes terribly, terribly wrong," said captain Emma Clippinger '09, before knocking on a wooden desk. "I think we'll probably go to nationals again. And, you know, it's not too much to expect top five" in the nation, she said.

But recently, the team ran into a hiccup when the barn was infected with strangles, a respiratory infection specific to barn animals. Clippinger described it as the horse version of strep throat, named for the sound infected horses make when they breathe. The infection is extremely contagious, but not fatal if treated with antibiotics.

The outbreak was at the top of the team's agenda at the team meeting two Fridays ago. Clippinger, who led the meeting, explained the extra precautions the team needed to take, such as dipping their boots into bleach before mounting any horses.

"Who has strangles?" one of the team members asked her at the meeting.

"Jazz and Bristol," Clippinger told the group.

"Aw, Jazz too?" another rider said.

It was easy to tell that something was wrong in the barn on Friday, March 13. The sides of Bristol's stall were boarded with fresh wood and the entrance was blocked off by a rope. Bristol stood in the stall with a green warmer wrapped around him, facing the outside of the barn, and his slow, warm breaths were visible in the cold barn air.

But the team had to continue. They had a competition the next day.

Across the barn, Dakota Gruener '11 brushed down Oliver in preparation for practice, first with a coarse comb and then with a softer brush.

"He's probably the nicest horse in the barn," Gruener said of Oliver. "I'm really pleased I got him today."

Not all of the riders were as pleased with the horses they landed for the day.

"I'm not looking forward to this. I'm not going to lie," Grover told her horse as she walked him out of the barn. "We are not friends."

Each practice, the riders get a new horse so they get used to riding all kinds of horses - the calm ones and the excited ones, the obedient ones and the rebellious ones. In competitions, the home school provides the horses and a random draw determines which rider gets which horse.

"The idea is that everyone should be able to perform equally on whatever horse. But there are better horses than others," Clippinger said. "If you get a bad horse, you're kind of screwed."

With the strangles infection in the barn last Friday, Coach Michaela Scanlon wanted to make sure that her riders took extra precautions, such as not wearing any equipment that they had worn at earlier practices, so as not to spread the infection.

As usual, the riders came to practice in small groups so that they could have enough horses and get enough individual attention. Once the riders were all tacked up, it was time to finally mount the horses and begin training. The five horses trotted out to the arena, a large building with an expansive dirt floor. The hooves clicked and spit up dirt as the girls trotted in circles around the arena, warming up the horses.

Most of the horses belong to Scanlon and some belong to others who use Scanlon's stables, but Brown owns three of the horses, as well.

"People donate horses because they get a tax write-off," Clippinger explained.

But horses aren't the only thing donors give to the team.

"The equestrian team has had great success," said Associate Athletic Director Carolan Norris. "So they have a great alumni network that supplements ... what they get from the University."

Norris declined to specify how much money the team receives from the University or donors.

The donations don't go unnoticed by the team. Victoria McCullough, owner of Chesapeake Petroleum, is one of the team's largest donors. According to Clippinger, McCullough paid for the team to go to Florida over winter break for a training trip.

"She loves to spoil us," Clippinger said. "She's kind of amazing."

The team competes in the Intercollegiate Horse Show Association, even though it is an NCAA team. There are 22 other NCAA equestrian teams, but Brown doesn't compete against them, as most of the NCAA programs are in the South and the West, too far from Providence to travel. The only other Ivy League school with an NCAA equestrian team is Cornell.

Being NCAA-affiliated means that the team receives more University funding, so Brown's riders don't have to pay anything to be on the team.

"Most teams that we play are actually club teams," Clippinger said. "They pay like $500 per semester. Some people (on other teams) pay for their lessons, and lessons are like $30 a lesson, so we're really lucky."

Competing in the IHSA also changes the format of the shows. In NCAA competitions, only the top riders score points for the teams, but in IHSA competitions, the riders are put in five divisions - walk trot, walk trot canter, novice, intermediate, and open - based on experience.

One rider from each division is chosen to be the point rider, and it is that rider's score that counts towards the team score.

With some sports, "you'll have the really good starter and the benchwarmer, but on our team everyone can be a point rider," Grover said. "Everyone is important."

The point riders for last Saturday's show at Johnson and Wales were announced eight days prior to the show, during the team meeting.

On Saturday, Brown's point riders placed first in four of the five divisions, earning the team a first-place finish in the tournament and in the final regular season standings of the region.

"It sounds bad to say this," Grover said. "But I was like, 'Yeah, we should win the region because we're that good.'"


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