Horses. My first love.

When I was a child, I would sketch horses all day. I would pretend to ride a horse in my back yard, bouncing around on a space hopper horse ("a what!?" you may ask, to which I would reply "a big ball with ear handles that I sat on and used my legs to bounce".... to which you may reply "wow"), designing and building jumping courses with upturned plant pots, brooms for poles on the green grass. I didn't come from a family that owned horses, or could afford one but I had a big imagination and a need to ride, so this was my horse. When I was 9 years old, I took group riding lessons at the local equestrian centre and my fate was sealed. I would one day be a horse owner.

When I emigrated to the USA, I finally started my horse fund. For 10 years I would save any spare money, always wishing and hoping for a horse of my own......that wish came true and she came to me in September of 2013.

In July 2013, I had started to help exercise a string of polo ponies at the barn I had previously leased a horse at. Out of the four horses I rode, one of the mares was for sale. A 15.3hh, seal bay Argentine Thoroughbred named Nochera.

One of the things I remember most about this introduction to polo horses were their funny roached manes and lack of forelock. 'Shaved to the wood' as we say in Scotland. 'Mr T on 4 legs'. Oh and they had stamina for weeks. Seriously, I would canter these horses straight for 16 minutes in 100 degree weather and they didn't break a sweat. An impressive bunch and a mixture of very stoic and very playful.

Looking back now, my honest first impression of her was not that memorable. She is physically stunning but she really didn't have much personality to speak of. I was used to the gelding I had been leasing - he is confident and pushy and cuddly. I can grab his whole head in my arms and smother him with kisses and he doesn't flinch (he's a boy, he usually just sticks his nose down my shirt). Although she is almost 16hh and muscular and strong, Nochera didn't take up much room. She was physically imposing but energetically, she was a bit of a wallflower. On the polo field, this mare was all business, fast, huge heart and competitive but I found that she didn't have a ton of energy or enthusiasm for being ridden non competitively. She would flat out gallop and chase that ball on the field because she knew her job but in training, she was crankier than the other horses and took a lot more leg to get going. On the ground, she would stand for hours at the tie rack without fussing or flinching. In essence, an amazing polo horse - easy around other horses, impeccable ground manners, no desire to cause trouble within the group (unlike the other mare in the string, who was what I would call 'an instigator') and she could run like the wind.

Nochera on the field at Will Rogers Polo Club, California

After 2 months of riding her and getting to know her before I bought her, I realized that even though she was cranky at times, she was basically a quiet, solid mare. She had some kinks and some stuff to work with but my basic requisite for a horse was 'no drama'. She fulfilled this criteria. On to the vet check. After a series of x-rays and tests, she passed! Not bad for a teenager from an athletic background. She was healthy and sound so.... voila, she was mine!

The night I bought her and her official retirement from polo. Here we are drinking champagne to celebrate our new partnership as horse and human. I'm Scottish, so her appreciation for the fine alcohol in life means that I like her already.

Nochera had been shipped from Argentina, where she had been a high goal polo horse. Arriving in the USA, she had become part of a very well cared for polo string and had a pretty regimented and structured life. During polo season, she had daily training, twice a day with the rest of the horses. Either ponied or ridden, she knew she had two sessions of cardio/conditioning training with sets of walk, trot, canter. Weekends, they were trailered to Will Rogers Polo Club and would play a couple of chukkers. Monday they had the day off. They had their hay and their buckets at a set time and life was very organized.

In the Winter of each year (October), polo was over for her and she and her compadres would load up in the trailer and head to the desert for 6 months of running free in the pasture. No humans, no riding, no polo, no work. She had lived this way for 6 years. She knew her routine and her life. She knew what her job was and she had consistency. Now she knew it was nearly party time.... but no, I put the kibosh on that when I bought her. They would leave, she would stay.

When I bought her in late September, her whole life changed. After a lifetime of athletic structure and routine as part of a group, she now had her very own human and she was officially retired from the game she knew so well. She had her very own stall. Her own food (no sharing with greedy pants Nic) and just one person to dote on her. And then her friends left.... for Nochera, communism was dead. Long live the 'only horse'!

"Well maybe this isn't so bad... I get to lay down and I have all my own food"

For the remainder of September, I gave her some downtime. For 2 weeks, I would come up and hand walk her around the barn, on the trails and in the arenas. I would ride her bareback and I worked her on the lunge line (she had never been lunged before and did NOT like it!)

"Yeah... uhhhh....where's the mallet at?"

We did a lot of walking together. We worked in the round pen to connect. Her ground manners were impeccable and the groundwork I put in helped me to see that she was really quite a shy mare and a little afraid to take up space with me. She wanted to get things 'right', she wanted permission and I got the strong feeling that she wasn't really sure what I wanted exactly. Polo she knew. In polo she was a 'made' horse but this life. Huh?

"Hmmmm, maybe my buddies are hiding over there?"

"Maybe this sign will tell me where they went? Hellllooooooo?"

I would turn her out in pasture to run around....

Ahem! The seriously beautiful horses don't 'do' turn out. They just stand around looking gorgeous and wistful.

She is a mare who has a lot of personal boundaries. She did not appreciate (or understand) when someone would walk up and touch her - she still doesn't with people she doesn't know. She would slowly back away and take herself out of your reach. She wanted to see you and keep you in her eye line. She was her own horse, introverted, stoic and a deep thinker. She would lick and chew almost constantly - I could actually feel the cogs turning in her head as she tried to process everything and everyone (she still does that but mostly when we are training).

We set up 'zen time' in the grooming process, as I got to know how she likes being handled (at that time she was head shy and didn't like her ears to be touched - now her ears are her FAVORITE scratch spot!). As time progressed, I could feel her defenses drop as she let me in and now grooming is quiet and relaxed and she is very considerate of my space.

I had a body worker assess her for muscle pain and give her massages, a chiropractor work the polo kinks out and I prepared to take her shoes off and ready her for a barefoot life (as a polo horse, she was barefoot 6 months out of the year in pasture, so she was used to it). I truly wanted to give her time to process and ease into her new life with me.

Getting some chiro work from Dr Jeff Shaffer

"Oh I guess getting a massage and stretching is okay"

Being an Argentine TB, Nochera actually has lovely strong feet and her x-rays showed she had thick soles, so transitioning from shoes to barefoot was working well.

At this time, I also started Nochera on a treatment for gastric ulcers. She was displaying symptoms and with all the stress, I didn't want to take any chances on a stress colic and I wanted to help her feel better. After a few weeks of the treatment, she was much happier and she started to gain weight again.

We trailered out to Hansen Dam Equestrian Centre for a play date and a Parelli class. Nochera did great but it wasn't really our thing (okay, maybe not really my thing - flags and sticks don't do it for me but she was thoughtful and relaxed in all of the exercises).

Nochera doing a more advanced 'squeeze' exercise. Nothing phases her.

Trailering home and reliving the old polo days. "Now will I see the mallet?" — Trailering home and reliving the old polo days. "Now will I see the mallet?"

Now we were into October and vacation was really over.

We started working with our trainer to assess Nochera's skills. She is what they call, dead broke but as a fast polo horse, she was .... fast. Kind of an oxymoron because she was actually lazy but when we did get going, everything was strung out and she wanted to rush, rush, rush. We needed to finesse the transitions. I was keen to start working her in the long and low principles of dressage and get her working from back to front (she was very built upfront but not as keen to come from her rear). We were basically beginning the retrain process and gently starting to work her body differently. Under saddle, she was - and still is - feisty and set in her ways (Nochera, not my trainer) but we worked through the issues as they came up.

Run. This is what she knew. At this point, she was not as keen on stopping or being asked to do fancy things with her body but she sure does look pretty when she's tacked up in her English gear.

At this point, she still needed a ton of leg to motivate her

We made some new barn friends (by now she was a little less concerned about her polo buddies and more open to new compadres).

And finally, after a few months of being very introverted and stoic, Nochera has her first "wheeeeeeee!" experience in the turnout (I'm guessing she realized she had to get her polo yaya's out somewhere) and went into full bronc mode.

Still gorgeous... just allowing herself to get a little sweaty

December, the shadows are shorter, the coats are shaggy and Nochera is trying out a new identity. She was very patient with my snapping a million photos and laughing my ass off at how cute this looks.

Reindeer Games. Her polo mane is growing out and we have mini-mohawk.

I had a lovely Christmas day trail ride with Santa's little helper.

By now, we were making a lot of new friends and regularly riding on fun trails together. We were learning how to stop appropriately (you take this for granted but with a polo horse, sometimes the brakes go on a little too fast or in Nochera's case, not at all) and under saddle, she was beginning to relax. She wasn't so tense and the head tossing and anxiety was lessening (I had her teeth floated and this helped a LOT!) There were no balls to chase, no ride offs and I could feel her mental focus start to shift. We were learning lateral work, softening in the poll / jaw and learning gentle up and down transitions. Some days were better than others but she was beginning to trust me and go with the flow a lot more. We were making progress!

We were also riding bareback a lot and learning to balance together.

A lot of the time I was spending under saddle, was in asking Nochera to 'give' and be supple. Compared to most of the horses I had ridden before, I found her to be a little stiff and unyielding but we were focusing on flexing and balance and within about 4 months, she was a different horse. She still seemed to have a real anxiety about feeling trapped. Even when given a longer rein and a light hand, she seemed confused when being asked for contact and fought against it. She was very sensitive in the mouth (I had switched from the Pelham bit she had been worked in to a snaffle) and being the sensitive mare that she is, she had a few temper tantrums during the first few months as she tried really hard to process all of this new information. When I was exercising the polo horses in canter sets, they were ridden in long reins with very little contact and were not being asked to work from the back into the bit, or to work into a loose frame. Nochera definitely felt more comfortable on the forehand and would pull the reins out of my hands (she still tries this) and thunder through transitions. Now we were fine tuning the up and down and she pulled and tossed and tried to run through them all. I got bucked in canter, I got dolphin hops in trot, I got a lot of ear pinning and sucking back but eventually, she got bored with fighting and started to loosen up. My mantra was the F word. FORWARD.

By the beginning of Spring we decided to introduce some gymnastics. She had been working over trot poles and hill work was now a part of our training schedule but my trainer and I were curious to see how she would handle some low cavaletti jumps.

She did great!

By now, the stoic, shy, introverted horse that she had been was blossoming into a confident, love bug. She liked to come right up to the tack room door and beg for carrots. I discovered that she really likes treats. I mean LIKE! likes them.

The mohawk was also increasing in height!

"Oh hi, there you are.... well since I'm here... maybe, carrots?"

We were getting our March rains and Nochera got to wear her new winter jacket and boss the feed truck around.

"Oh hello hay truck, you are late. I'm starving!"

By now, her mane was really growing out (it was starting to lean sideways instead of straight up) and her forelock was standing to attention. 2014 became "MANE WATCH" and I was tempted to shave it all off again (thankfully I waited and now she has a lovely, flowing mane). All in all, at around 6-7 months, she had really settled into our routine together and we were having a lot of fun.

"I'm waiting on carrots.... I'll wait all day"

"My Mom went to the Horse Expo and all I got was this ridiculously comfortable bareback pad"

In May, I decided to start some straightness training. We are still having some leaning/balance issues and even though her muscles and her mind have changed a lot, she still falls to old polo habits.

Working on engaging her hind and getting her off of her inside shoulder

We're into week 2 and Nochera is strengthening those muscles and beginning to work without falling on my legs and rein so much.

Her previous owner commented at the start that he felt Nochera and I were soul mates and I think he might be right. Eight months in, we're very happy together, she seems to have accepted me in her herd and we're definitely a work in progress.

My first horse

ELLE NEWLANDS

My first horse

Life....

ELLE NEWLANDS