BY RACHEL MEDBERY, DAFFODIL HILL FARM LLC
Ask any event rider what their cross-country pace should be, and most will give you a confident answer. Ask them to ride it — and hold it over varied terrain — and a very different picture emerges. Pace is the skill that riders assume they have, and that almost no one has actually been taught.
The USEA Foundation recognized this gap when it launched the TEAPRO Grant (Training and Education in the Art of Pace and Riding in the Open) in 2026, noting that “it is difficult for many in our sport to learn the art of riding at pace and even to find places where they can ride outside a ring before coming to a competition.” Ride the Pace was awarded one of the first TEAPRO grants — and the program is already putting that funding to work.
Where It Started
Ride the Pace grew out of a personal challenge. In 2025, while preparing to compete in the Waredaca Classic Three-Day Event, I found myself confronting one of the most technically demanding phases in equestrian sport: steeplechase. Fast, forward, and unforgiving, it demanded not just fitness but feel — the ability to maintain a consistent, effective pace with confidence.
Rather than face that challenge alone, I organized a steeplechase-focused clinic at Fox Race Farm in Millbrook, NY, with trainer Booli Selmayr. Eight riders participated, many preparing for the same event. What emerged was more than a training session — it was a shared space to build skills, ask hard questions, and prepare together.
I completed the Waredaca Classic “on a number, not a letter.” But the most lasting lesson had nothing to do with my own result: confidence in riding pace cannot be developed in a single session. It requires repetition, intention, and consistent access to well-structured training opportunities. That realization became the foundation for Ride the Pace.
The Program
Ride the Pace is a structured training series designed to help eventers, foxhunters, and hunter pacers develop the feel, accuracy, and confidence to ride correct pace in open country. The 2026 program launched under the TEAPRO grant with a series of unmounted and mounted sessions, built around meaningful facility partnerships and a shared commitment to keeping open land available for equestrian sport.
The program launched with an unmounted session hosted by Ali Fisher at Stoneleigh Farm in Brewster, NY. Focused on timing tools — including the “big yellow watch” — the session gave riders a practical foundation in pace awareness before ever getting on a horse. From there, the mounted work began.
Corinne at Frazier Farm in Woodbury, CT partnered with the program to host the initial workshop series: four consecutive Thursday sessions in April and May, intentionally timed to allow riders to practice before the Frazier Farm schooling horse trials on June 7th. Three of the four workshops have now been completed. The fourth was rained out — a reminder that open country riding comes with the full reality of the outdoors.
Building on the momentum from the 2025 pilot, a two-part mounted series with Booli Selmayr returns to Fox Race Farm in June. These sessions advance the work done in the earlier workshops — developing rider position and transitioning flat work into jumping confidently from a galloping stride.
Why This Matters Now
The TEAPRO grant exists because pace training is a recognized, national problem — not just a regional one. Riders across every level arrive at competitions without a reliable internal sense of speed. They guess, they go “fast enough,” and they collect time penalties or ride unsafely as a result. The tools to fix this are not complicated. What has been missing is structured access to open country, qualified instruction, and a community willing to practice together.
There is also a land access dimension to this work that cannot be ignored. Open space for eventing, hunter pacing, and foxhunting is disappearing. Ride the Pace is deliberately built around supporting the landowners, organizers, and professionals who have dedicated their careers to keeping that space available. Every facility partnership is a vote of confidence in the future of the sport.
Built on Partnership
Ride the Pace is supported by Strider as a registration partner, making clinic access and enrollment straightforward for riders across the program. The Frazier Farm workshop series is also supported by Grand Prix Equine Veterinary Practice, whose involvement reflects the program’s broader commitment to soundness, education, and horsemanship.
The program is also developing an online course and expanded workshop series to bring pace training to riders beyond the immediate region. The goal is to ensure that what the TEAPRO grant has seeded in 2026 continues to grow — in Area 1 and beyond.
Ride the Pace is more than a training series. It is a commitment to developing skill, confidence, and community through shared experience — and to building a lasting framework for education in a part of the sport that has gone undertaught for too long.
Learn More at YouTube: youtube.com/@ridethepace or Register for workshops: striderpro.com (search “Riding the Pace”)
USEA TEAPRO Grant: useventing.com
