Courtney Brockmueller and Boys Move Over Win Amateur Hunter Under Saddle in Last Performance Before Retirement

By: Brittany Bevis

Today, Courtney Brockmueller shared the saddle with her almost three-year-old son, Brim, aboard Boys Move Over, for the cutest victory lap we’ve ever seen, this afternoon at the AQHA World Championship Show. But this isn’t the first victory lap for Brim. The last time Courtney won Amateur Hunter Under Saddle was in 2013 with a horse named Allocate In Blue. At that time, she was pregnant with Brim and due in only a couple months.

This was an emotional win for another reason, because it marks the final performance for Boys Move Over, aka “Black Betty,” who will now retire to broodmare. “That was the end of this chapter for Betty, so now she goes on from here to be a broodmare,” Courtney says. “She’s won everything she can win for us, and we feel like she’s going to be really instrumental in mom’s breeding program.”

At this point in her career, the 5-year-old black mare was accumulated $35,000 in earnings and 200 AQHA points in addition to winning multiple titles at the NSBA World Show. She was also named the World Champion in Junior Hunter Under Saddle with Courtney’s mother, Nancy Sue Ryan, and Reserve with Courtney in 2014.

“That kind of left me hungry,” she says. “I’ve never worked so hard on a horse or had so much faith in a horse. I really wanted a chance to get her what she deserved. This is the first horse that I’ve ever shown twice in Amateur Hunter Under Saddle. In 2011, I won with Fabulicity. Then, I won with Allocate In Blue in 2013. I was Reserve with Gracious N Fabulous in 2012 and then Reserve with Betty in 2014.”

Knowing that this would be the final time she would trot into the show pen aboard Black Betty, Courtney was feeling a little emotional. “I  almost got a little choked up walking down the tunnel. I thought, ‘This is it. We’ve done what we can do, and it will be what it will be.’ I wanted to do my best to get her presented the best I could and have faith that she would let me do that. She was the only horse we had here, so we were really consistent in keeping her ready.”

Looking forward to the next chapter in Black Betty’s story, Courtney is very excited to see the type of babies her beloved mare will produce. She even has her first cross planned. “We’re in the process of freezing semen to the 2-year-old that I recently sold, Give Me The Goods. He’s by Good I Will Be and out of the mare, Fabulicity. That’s really special to me, because I showed his mother, and she was my first World Champion in Hunter Under Saddle. I really loved that horse. I’ve been riding he and Betty this year together thinking I can’t wait to ride this cross!”

In Courtney’s opinion, Black Betty is the “last of a dying breed,” because she’s by the late stallion, Skys Blue Boy. It’s Courtney’s hope that Black Betty will be able to infuse her exotic style into the next generation of Hunter Under Saddle horses.

“She has such a unique style through her neck and is so great through her front legs, but she still has a lot of strength through her hock. Also, she’s beautiful over her back when you take off her saddle. She’s really a talented mare with a lot of unique, exotic features that we’ve been missing out on. I would love to get a few mini Black Betty’s!”

The Reserve Champion in today’s class was Meghan Tierney with Pretty Assets. Third was Rebekah Kazakevicius with Not Just Anyhoo. Fourth was Hannah Aho with Alonzo Mourning. Fifth was Taylor Brown with Al Be Seeing Ya.