Tuesday March 25, 2003

A New Leo In Her Life - Anne Gribbons and Leoliet

“Two weeks after we met, we had our first show,” said Anne Gribbons about her new partnership with the Dutch warmblood stallion Leoliet. By the sixth week, the duo was competing in their third show, the Zada Enterprises, LLC WEF Dressage Classic CDI***/Y, March 13-16 in Wellington, Florida, and scoring well in two CDI classes – the Prix St. Georges (66.4%) and Intermediaire I (65.5%) for 8th and 11th place respectively. “So far he’s been very kind and very consistent, so we hope that that continues. But you know with horses, especially a stallion, there’s the ring and outside the ring – and you need to get to know all about him, so we are ‘getting to know you’,” she sings in tune.

Judy Bernier has owned Leoliet, an eight-year-old, 16.3-hand, bay by Zeoliet out of Dorien (a Roemer mare), since he was imported as a young horse. Initially, Tom Noone showed him in Young Horse classes, but it was Canadian Shannon Oldham-Dueck who did the major training and created a well-known and successful partnership. “She is really the one who taught him everything he knows and she should have all the credit in the world for that,” states Anne, “because he is, although a magnificent horse, not easy, and like all breeding stallions, he has agendas of his own, and they are never the same two days in a row.”