Working Hunter

Taylor Myers continues her family's winning ways.

by Holly Clanahan
The American Quarter Horse Journal

When Taylor Myers goes to a horse show, you can bet it’s a family affair. And the 2012 Built Ford Tough AQHYA World Championship Show is no different. Both Taylor, 18, and her sister, Mallory, 17, were in the working hunter finals August 7.

Their parents, Drs. Scott and Leslie Myers, share the rides on the horses their daughters show, and Scott, as a matter of fact, won a world championship in hunter hack at the 2011 Adequan Select World Championship Show on board Capture The Flag, the 2004 black gelding who’s also ridden by Taylor.

The Myers family will have to find room on the mantle for another trophy now, as Taylor and “Radar” took home gold in working hunter. And just minutes after Taylor celebrated her win, her sister, Mallory, scored a world championship in jumping aboard Darn That Kat, a multiple world champion in the Select arena.

“We’re used to always competing together,” Taylor said. “We do all the shows together, and me and my sister are always in the same classes, so we are used to it by now, and it’s always fun to have a little sibling competition. It helps that our parents both show, so they can give us advice and kind of help us more than the average parent would.”

Taylor said she enjoys partnering with her dad on Radar.

“He can relate to me and the problems that I have when riding (Radar), so we both help each other out and give each other pointers,” Taylor said. Not that the laid-back son of The Last Captive causes much trouble, “but sometimes you just have your little problems that you need advice fixing.”

Radar can sometimes be a little timid when jumping, and Taylor herself battles show nerves, so as she entered the arena for the working hunter finals, she just focused on getting around the course smoothly.

“I’ve been riding all summer; we’ve been practicing,” she said. “We go to shows all year long to prepare for this, so it’s kind of a yearlong thing.”

It’s especially nice that Taylor can get day-to-day expert advice from her family members, since their trainer, AQHA Professional Horseman Alfred Hewitt, lives in Loxahatchee, Florida.

“We meet him at the shows because we’re from (Sharon Center), Ohio, so it’s kind of long distance, but we get help from him at the horse shows. Basically, we practice mostly on our own,” Taylor said. “It’s nice when everyone rides, because we all know how hard it is and what it is that each horse needs help with, so we can all give each other advice. It works out nicely.”

Taylor, who has one more year of youth eligibility, has learned a lot from her horse-centric family and from Alfred’s influence.

“You just need to practice as much as you possibly can,” she said, “and don’t get discouraged if you have a bad ride or a bad fence in one of your classes. Just look for the positive things in your course and have faith that it’s all going to come together eventually and you’re going to get that solid course down eventually.”