I bought a medium pony from a student who had out grown her in Roswell. A really pretty little bay mare, she was very well schooled and became a school horse for us. "Coquette" had the typical pony's inclination to jump the fences that horses twice her size jumped. Before I bought her, her little girl and my working student were schooling for a show. We knew the outside hunt course well - there was a 3'3" white rolltop with a 4'3" spread to it. It was off a kind of corner and weird looking to the horses (and us, to be honest!). My students and I had been jumping that heighth and width, but we all kept worrying about that rolltop. My brother's idea was to build and paint that jump for us. So, with a copy of it sitting in our jump arena, I set up a jumping lane down one long side. It was just a one stride, bounce, bounce and 2 stride, then a left turn to get to the rolltop going in the opposite direction. It rode brilliantly! The girls just flew over the rolltop after the gymnastic and we were in awe of little Coquette. After adding a little course and clearing the rolltop twice, the girls all wanted to go over it "one more time"... this is always risky. And I know better - when things go so well, STOP, reward the horse, pat yourself on the back... but we made the mistake and rode to it one more time. We taught all the horses to refuse that jump that day. And once the horses' confidence (and the girls') was shaken, they all had trouble at the show at that fence. I write about mistakes I've made and ones I have watched through these many years with the hope that someone reading about them won't make them, too.
Coquette was a favorite with young students. I had a meek young girl who adored her and rode her at shows some. This little girl was blonde, wore thick glasses and was so very, very quiet. We were loading horses one morning for a show and Coquette was the third one up the ramp (where the horses were turned around and backed into their stalls). I turned her around (she had done this dozens of times) and, being such a sly pony, she knew I was just expecting her cooperation. She bolted out of my hands with a squeal and galloped down the ramp! The little blonde girl just took hold of the lead shank as it flew by her and when Coquette felt the connection, she "doubled" at the constraint of the line. We all just stood blinking for a moment since it had happened so fast and the outcome was a pure shock! The girl led the pony up the ramp to me and Coquette never did that again.
