This message is from: "Sam & Sue Banks" <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
I was notified by Rebecca Mayer that my horse, BDF Lillehammer, has qualified for the NFHR Versatility Award. To quote her breeder, Carol Rivoire, who posted about the multi-purpose Fjord style on the list a few days ago in the discussions - "This is the kind of Fjord I believe in, and have been breeding for many years. -- However, I still expect this kind of Fjord to be capable of draft work. He should have enough bone and enough sense to do draft work when asked. -- But, he is not a specialist. -- He's a good riding horse, driving horse, and also capable of doing draft work." Besides earning blue ribbons in USDF dressage classes, Lilly has received blue ribbons at NFHR Evaluations in the Introductory and Advanced level performance tests in English Riding, Carriage Driving and Draft. She has been trained and shown by me, an adult amateur, and is the first horse I have ever shown in USDF classes. We attended the Virginia Pre-Evaluation clinic the end of April to have our first lessons in draft work from Brian Jensen and Ryland Moore, and by the Evaluation in July, she passed her Advanced Draft test with me holding the lines! I can't say enough good things about this horse's trainability, work ethic, patience, and personality to allow me to learn how to train a horse while I am still learning the subject myself, and all this with a handler who has back pain, rides crooked, and has bad days. I'm glad the evaluators were able to overlook several handler errors at the Evaluation - as my sister said, it was obvious it was a novice handler trying to do the advanced draft and driving tests. Thank you to all the people who have helped me along the way to make this possible. Sue Banks, Mattaponi, VA
