Looks like it starts around $900.
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Just move to Europe if you have those connections and want to ride. I have friends who are showing up to national GP level and do well on horses they own and they are in regular jobs like vet, nurse, recruiting etc. Everything is hugely cheaper: look up the cost of a horse van in the UK vs a truck and trailer in the USA, it’s literally 10 times more to buy something to transport 2 horses in the US. Shows are easily 10x more in the USA, horses are laughably cheaper to buy, even winter circuits are far, far cheaper. You can do the Sunshine Circuit and stay on-site in rider housing for about 30E per night etc. Month to month boarding is cheaper and in many places co-ops are common with other good competitive riders so you can DIY and just have a coach instead of a US style trainer.
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I have two relatives, both math majors 20 years ago and now in their early 40s. Both are smart and fairly hard working but also aspire to work/life balance. One became a math teacher and has risen to become an assistant principal. He will probably become a principal eventually. He and his wife, who works in a leadership role for a non-profit and makes about the same $$ as he does, can afford a 3 bedroom home and some DIY home improvement projects in a LCOL area and public school, local sports, and music lessons for their 3 kids. Vacations are road trips to visit relatives, and/or see national parks. Horses would be out of the question, even regular lessons. Maybe a week of pony camp each summer if one of the kids REALLY wanted it. They have had to tell their middle school son no to traveling team baseball (about 10 away tournaments with motel stays). His cousin, also a math major at a comparable college, became an actuary and has risen to middle management aiming for upper management with a large insurance company. His wife works part time as a physical therapist. They can afford private school for their kids, a large home in a golf course community + golf several times a week and golf lessons for the kids, plenty of nice (often golf oriented) vacations, etc. I expect they could afford a horse or maybe two in a good local program and monthly weekend shows instead of the golf and golf vacations. But probably not full time on the A circuit and whole winters in Florida. I’m not sure that he is any happier or more satisfied with his life than his math teacher cousin, or whose kids are truly getting the better upbringing. But he certainly has more $$$ on his way to $$$$ with the same undergrad degree. So yes, a career as an actuary progressing to executive has been lucrative for him so far and allows some work/life balance although the golf may also be used as an opportunity for business networking.
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Here is a recent interview with someone at the top of the sport–this should give you a good picture of how someone gets there if they are NOT uber wealthy.
https://horsenetwork.com/2024/09/erynn-ballard-ten-years-ago-i-was-known-as-a-hunter-rider/?amp=1
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I always liked her, nice people. Wonderful Hunter rider.
Please note she has primarily ridden other people’s horses and been paid for it because she is dam good at it. She stepped back from her own personal goals for some time to teach and train for the family business. Then went to work riding for somebody else to pursue her own goals. The horses she has in training now are largely funded by others.
Think Kent Farrington is a better example of starting with nothing. Middle class family with NO horse background. Started with weekly up down lessons, working student type. He has said one of his biggest challenges is finding the right horses, owners to fund them and hanging on to them. One of his current owners has been with him for a very long time.
You could put Mike Matz in that starting from nothing group but he took another path and married well. Very well and into a top horsey family.
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Erin Ballard is a great example of someone who managed to hang on in the sport through her family connections till she got her break. I rode professionally till my early 20s and same thing- when the quality of horses declined post YR age and I was looking at teaching hunter riders for a living I just quit and went to work in science. But we didn’t have a farm so I was looking at having to work for someone else, having to take a gamble and go on the road and give up my established life at home and not really be able to afford to breed or make my own. That’s where the sport is losing young pros, regional pros etc. The requirement to be in Florida or similar all winter, the lack of support for U25 riders, the lack of riding jobs, the cost of land, and the gatekeeping of all of it by the older pros.
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OP, IIRC you were considering going to boarding school? Did that work out?
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Unfortunately I can’t go to boarding school. It would disrupt my studies, and I need to focus this year because I have a lot of tests coming up. I still consider college in Europe though.
It’s easy to think the grass is greener on the other side-- other people are at a better/cooler school and getting more opportunities, other people are showing more and with better horses, etc. But with age comes some perspective. There’s a lot of happiness to be had at all different price points and experiences. Would I be a happier person if I showed 5 horses on the circuit all winter long? Honestly, no. It’s nice to daydream about things like that, but when it actually gets down to brass tacks-- there’s a lot of happiness and satisfaction to go around but part of getting it starts with being realistic and not always feeling like bigger is better and more is the goal.
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I think that’s another one of our younger posters. OP was looking for braiding guidance to offset showing expenses but I don’t think she’s posted about boarding school but I may be misremembering.
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You could be forgiven for getting those posters confused (or thinking it’s the same poster with different screen names) given the similarities in their description of their situation/questions/writing style. But regardless, I think OP has gotten some terrific advice here.
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Slightly OT, but interested to hear how others have experienced variations on this theme of moral/ethical conflicts at work, mainly how prevalent are they across the industries/professions suggested here and what is “normal” vs actually putting a person at personal/professional risk if they don’t leave?
While what you, mika, have talked about includes flat out illegal activity, I am really thinking more along the lines of resolving moral conflicts in greyer areas. E.g. as you go up the leadership chain in an org, you inevitably have to meditate interpersonal conflicts among staff - or decide to escalate to HR. Lots of fraught choices to make here.
I have been called pollyanna-ish on more than one occasion, not just related to work, and I get the impression my personal guardrails are too absolute. Most of my career, I have not had to worry about this at all, other than dealing with small amounts of sexual harassment directed at me, and I had trustworthy people in my corner for support, thankfully.
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I can’t remember the origin but there’s the quote: There is no such thing as an ethical billionaire.That amount of capital is only possible through exploitation: of the people, of the system, and of the environment
I feel like the same is true for large corporations and the further up the ladder you climb the more you are asked to make decisions that are morally gray.
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This. For profit corporations are often in direct conflict with what is best for their employees or clients. When the bottom line is making money for shareholders or CEOs the product and the integrity is often compromised. When you become indoctrinated into the corporate culture you slowly lose your integrity to the product and the worker. This is a failure of what our culture of capitalism has become. Good in theory perhaps but corrupted as every other human ideology always is.
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Even non profits get corrupted by greed despite starting with good intentions…or not.
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There was a poster who lived in Texas who was looking to go to a boarding school with a show team and horses on-site (I believe in Virginia) with very high tuition (something crazy, at least as much as going to college if not more). She would have had to have leased out her personal hunter to afford the school so she couldn’t do boarding school AND continue to show on the circuit. So she was hoping to find other ways to make money to avoid this dilemma.
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Yeah, think that one also had an International background.
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I just remember that thread well, because some people were like, “you poor thing,” and all I could think of was that if that dilemma was posted anywhere else, people would be like, “girl…”
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That is the main reason why I never sought a role as a people leader. I was forced into that role some 30 years ago when I was the first person in my role to be hired but we quickly realized we needed more resources in that area and I was made the manager of that team. I then had to lay everyone off a few years later during an economic downturn. I have resisted climbing the mgmt ladder ever since - and esp. after watching multiple managers at multiple employers throw their people under the bus to save their own skin or ingratiate themselves with upper managers. No thank you - I will just stay in the trenches where I won’t be expected to stab my troops in the back to satisfy the whim of some UL manager.
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I’ve been following this thread with interest. And debated whether to say something which is perhaps not germane to the question, but here goes.
OP, part of becoming an adult is realizing that you don’t always get what you want when you want it. It’s also realizing that spending your life on the show circuit with multiple horses isn’t the pot of gold at the end of the rainbow.
Like many others, I had to stop showing horses when I aged out of juniors and went to college. Since the only good thing about my childhood was horses, I was desperate to get back to them. It took a while, but eventually I became that person for whom a really nice horse and shows every week was doable. I started riding again and got a nice horse–not WEF quality but wonderful for regaining my riding chops after years away. I started showing locally and thinking about next steps.
That was when I realized that I didn’t really want to spend my winters in Florida, or my summers travelling from one showground to another, and only seeing and talking to the same people week after week. There is so much “real life” you have to give up if you want to do that. Money, sure. But also time, relationships, travel, cultural and educational opportunities, etc. Over the years, I’d watched friends do that (talented amateurs on HOY horses). Eventually I’d also seen them get tired of the grind and give up riding entirely.
I ended up staying with my local shows and having a ball. Now (because I’m old) I have racehorses. OP, please think seriously about whether you want showing horses and living on the show circuit to be the biggest single priority of your life. My vote would be no. You’re young, you have plenty of options. Choose a career path you think you’ll enjoy. Don’t be saddled with a degree or a job you dislike just because someone tells you it might bring in enough money to take you to WEF.
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