Live From the 2014 AQHA Youth World Cup With Team USA’s Ali Fratessa

By: Brittany Bevis

Equestrian teams from Australia, Austria, Belgium, Canada, the Czech Republic, Denmark, the Dominican Republic, France, Germany, Ireland, Israel, Italy, Luxembourg, New Zealand, Norway, Paraguay, Switzerland, the United Kingdom, and USA have gathered in Bryan, Texas for the 2014 AQHA Youth World Cup! An elite international event that focuses on fun and fellowship, the Youth World Cup is held every two years and hosted by a different country each time.

Youth competitors from all over the world will compete in ten classes including showmanship, western pleasure, horsemanship, hunter under saddle, hunt seat equitation, western riding, trail, reining, and cutting aboard horses they’ve never ridden before.

Representing Team USA this year is Alessandra Fratessa, Kalee McCann, Jack Medows, Carli Pitts, Graysen Stroud, Bailey Cook, Chloe Bening, Lindsay Brush, Mary Claire Cornett, and Colby Ringer. Team USA, along with the international teams, will be showing off their skills for judges April Devitt and Derek Hansome during the horse show portion of the event.

There are plenty of fun social events planned as well including a tour of the Texas A&M Veterinary School, George Bush Presidential Library and Museum, and Blue Bell Creameries in Brenham. Team parents will have time to socialize as well during a day trip to the local outlet mall, Messina Hof Winery, and Downtown Bryan.

Today, competitors will enjoy participating in a trail clinic, hunter under saddle clinic, and dinner and performance with Templeton Thompson. The horse show will take place on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday with an Awards Brunch to follow on Sunday.

Also, the Bank of America Youth Excellence Seminar is currently underway and will continue through July 10th. AQHYA members age 10-18 can enjoy participating in officer elections, an awards banquet, seminars, and fun leadership activities.

Click here to view a schedule of events for the Youth World Cup.

Click here to view the live webcast for the Youth World Cup.

Click here for Cutting results.

A huge thank you goes to Ali Fratessa for providing us with an informative blog and fun photos from the AQHA Youth World Cup! Go Team USA!

EC Blog by: Ali Fratessa- Team USA Rider

The ten days of the 2014 AQHA Youth World Cup are filled with a whirlwind of leadership and social activities and of course riding! Each country is allowed a team of five riders, that will compete in seven all-around events plus cutting and reining, and up to five leadership team members to support and cheer on their teammates, who also take part in all Youth World Cup activities and clinics.

The opening ceremonies on the 4th of July were incredibly colorful and majestic. During the Parade of Teams, all 16 international teams from Australia to the USA displayed their countries flags. The United Kingdom even had team members dressed like Queen Elizabeth and members of the Royal Family!

When Team USA entered the arena with manager Suzy Jeane and Coach Nancy Cahill, we each carried a United States flag. We all felt such pride in representing our country as we stood in the center of the arena and our National Anthem was played to honor the USA as the host country of the 2014 AQHA Youth World Cup. Then, we got down to business. Each team had a team member draw for their set of horses. Each team gets a set of five all-around horses, plus a cutter and a reiner, that they have never ridden before.

All the teams were excited to go meet their equine partners and begin getting to know them! We have five days to work with the horses before the competition begins, and it seems to fly by! There is a strict schedule limiting when we are allowed to work with the horses that are generously donated for the event, to ensure they get plenty of rest, so we have to make each session count.

That evening at the new Texas A & M Hildebrand Equestrian Center, we were treated to the Little Aggie Wranglers dance team exhibition and even got western swing lessons from them! Then, we went outside and watched the 4^th of July fireworks from the George Bush Library and headed back to the dorms to get some rest.

So far, we have ridden on Friday and Saturday morning and a Sunday morning and afternoon session including western riding (USA Graysen Stroud), western pleasure (USA Carli Pitts and Jack Medows), and horsemanship (USA Ali Fratessa, Kalee McCann and Graysen Stroud) clinics given by top AQHA trainers such as Robin and Jenny Frid, Adam Wainscott, Ricky Spinks, Caroline Gunn Rogers, Katie Lisabeth, and Michelle Forness. All of the teams’ horses got the day off on Monday when we went to the beautiful Champion Ranch in Centerville for the cutting competition. Germany won 1^st Place and Team USA’s Kalee McCann placed 6^th and 7^th!

Fast forward to Tuesday, July 8th 2014

I started my morning by waking up at 4:30 am along with Team USA’s Coach Nancy Cahill to prepare for a television interview on KBTX’s Good Morning Brazos Valley. It was really exciting to be interviewed on live TV and to be able to share with viewers what the AQHA Youth World Cup event is all about. After the interview, we arrived back at the Brazos County Expo and our horses had already been fed by our amazing volunteers headed up by Dr. Tommy Thomas and former Team USA members Logan Pluhar and Sarah Ann Pendergraft who came to help. It’s a huge job taking care of almost 100 horses each day.

We gave our horses fresh water, cleaned our stalls, and then saddled the horses.

The horses we used in the equitation clinic this morning were Ben, KC, and JoJo. Team USA equitation riders Graysen Stroud, Kalee McCann, and I switched mounts during the equitation clinic given by Mark Dunham, Sharon Wellman, and Becky George. After the clinic, our awesome Team USA leadership members, Chloe Bening and Bailey Cook, along with riders Carli Pitts and Jack Medows took care of the horses so Kalee, Graysen, myself and our other Team USA leadership members, Mary Claire Cornett, Lindsay Brush, and Colby Ringer could dash over to the AQHYA YES (Youth Excellence Seminar) convention meeting rooms in time to set up our campaign posters and meet the YES attendees. Each of us are also running for national director/officer positions with the AQHYA.

Team USA then headed over to the dining room for lunch and to hear some amazing stories from motivational speakers who talked to us about overcoming adversity and never giving up!

After lunch, we went to our YES Regional breakout meeting rooms to give our campaign speeches and vote for directors. Most of us had prepared our speeches several months ago, but I did see some last minute rewrites happening in the hallways! There was also an interesting Cultural Awareness lecture where speakers from different countries spoke about differences in nationalities and cultures. One of the speakers was even completely dyed BLUE to illustrate this!  We then went back to the barn where Graysen, Kalee, and I worked on showmanship. We have one horse that has never even never done it before! Then, it was time to head back to the dorms to get ready for the YES dance! It has been so much fun to visit with AQHYA members from all over the world who share the same love of horses that we do!

Today is our last day to work with the horses before the 1st go round of all-around competition beginning on Thursday, July 10^th.  Wish Team USA good luck!

Ali Fratessa

Team USA for The Equine Chronicle