Jessie Lampe (Phoenixville, Pennsylvania) and her own Rehbein grabbed the win in the competitive class, stopping the timers at 31.918 seconds. Skip Bailey’s course included an option for what looked like an impossible turn. Making that turn made all the difference for the top-two finishers, the only riders of the 38 entries to attempt it.
“It’s such an honor to compete in this company and be competitive and win,” Lampe said. “I didn’t even go to that jump planning to do a turn. It was just a magic moment of mind reading and we did it! This division is so competitive and whenever you have that option you have to do it to win.”
Lampe and Rehbein, a 19-year-old Oldenburg gelding by Riverman, have been together for eight years. She has the occasional lesson but for the most part doesn’t jump at home.
“We do a lot of hill work and a lot of hacking out and it keeps him fit and happy,” she said. “I think he looks forward to our time in the show ring as much as I do because he knows he gets to jump.”
Lampe doesn’t train with anyone right now. “I am a lone soldier,” she said. “I’ve always been a working student or a working boarder. I couldn’t come yesterday because I was waitressing all night and I pay for a lot of this myself.”
Lampe and Rehbein will compete at the Zone 2 Jumper Championships at Princeton next weekend. She hopes to qualify for the Washington International Horse Show and the Pennsylvania National Horse Show. She is considering retiring him at 20 during Devon.
Second-place finisher Kaitlyn Hess, an amateur from Rio Grande, New Jersey, went straight from the pony hunters into the jumpers. She leased Belladonna from her trainer Katherine Pontone and drives an hour and 45 minutes six days a week to ride and train.
“I decided to do it (the turn) because Bella turns very quickly and it’s really easy for her,” But this is my first year in the jumpers, so it’s more of a me-thing than a her-thing.”
Hess said that Pontone did the Child/Adults with Belladonna back in 2013 and they won at Washington, Devon and the Winter Equestrian Festival. “I know the horse can do it, so I have big shoes to fill,” she said.
Dakota Champey (Far Hills, New Jersey) took the third and fourth-place prizes with her two mounts Caprice and Unsomnie De La Roque, both owned by MDHT Equestrian LLC. With Caprice, she clocked the jump-off time to beat of 33.985 for the lion’s share of the class.
Her identical twin sister, Hunter Champey earned eighth in the class with Backstory, owned by David Hopper. They both ride with Emil Spadone and Redfield Farm.