Hayley Frielick makes her northern hemisphere five-star debut this week at the Mars Maryland 5 Star.
The 29-year-old rider is something of a citizen of the world. Her parents are from South Africa and she was born in the USA, but raised in Australia and also spent some years living in Scotland.
“It’s been a long time coming getting over here,” said Hayley after her dressage test yesterday on Dunedin Black Watch (Nelson). “I originally had another horse I wanted to come over with in 2020, but obviously we had to change plans with Covid.
“I’m so excited we got to bring this guy – I wanted to come for this event because I thought it’d be a great track for a thoroughbred, hilly and twisty. He’s like a little speed car.”
When Hayley started looking into making the trip in June, she discovered flights for Dunedin Black Watch and her five-year-old home-bred called Dunedin My Goodness were scarce.
She explained: “We had two weeks notice – they said, ‘Do you want this flight or not? We’re not sure when the next one will be.’ So I had to chuck the horses on a plane and say, ‘See you over there, guys’ and pack up the rest of my stuff in Australia.
“They had to go a very long way around – Melbourne, Hanoi, Doha, Luxembourg, Chicago and then truck to Philadelphia. So it worked out well that Nelson came earlier because he needed some time to recover after that trip.”
Hayley Frielick is now based with Australian rider Dominic Schramm and his wife Jimmie just 20 minutes down the road from Maryland 5 Star.
“I haven’t bought my ticket home,” she said. “The plan was just to do this and focus on that afterwards, but I’m loving it so far. I am lucky that I was born here and have a US passport, so hopefully I can’t get kicked out. So for the foreseeable future, I think I’m sticking around.”
Hayley Frielick and her best friend Katie Robertson bought Nelson together.
“Katie is sort of posh and Scottish, and I took her to the outback to look at these off-the-track thoroughbreds,” said Hayley. “The first one was called Bob and she went, ‘Oh, I want that one because his name’s Bob.’ Then we saw Nelson and she said, ‘I like the little black one, he’s got a good canter – can we take him too?’
“We got them on a two for one deal and the other horse, Bob – ironically named Dunedin The Brave, because he was scared of his own tail when we got him – qualified for four-star too. So we’ve been very l lucky getting off-the-track thoroughbreds that have just happened to go up the levels. I don’t know that it’s always that easy.”
Hayley says Nelson is “the biggest pet and the apple of my eye”.
She said: “He wants to eat all your food and cuddle. He hates other horses, but loves people and loves other animals. Dom and Jimmie have cats and one of them has ridden him, and he’s best friends with my Labrador, who also flew over from Australia.”
The pair scored 38.5 for their dressage test yesterday and Hayley was delighted with Nelson.
“He was brilliant – I’m so stoked with him,” she said. “He felt like he was really with me in there. I thought with the race track nearby and all that was going on here, he might be a bit more excitable. I could have ridden a few parts better because he actually really wanted to do a great test.”
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