Ashburton - Sophie Sauer
Sophie Sauer
Sophie is 13 years old, lives in Methven and is year 8 at Mount Hutt College. Sophie attends Methven Pony Club where she is wokring towards her C certificate. Sophie got her first pony when she was two and has competed in lead rein classes since she was 4. Sophie attends all things ponyclub, loves trekking and regularly rides out on a high country cattle muster. She has competed up to 80cm at local ponyclub and A&P Shows.
Sophie rides Griffindor Robinson, who is known at home as Griff. Griff is an 8 year old, Nati breed 14.2 Gelding. Sophie and Griff are a new ombination having been paired together since May this year. Sophie and Griff’s goals for this season are to get out and about in the Show Hunter Ring, build their partnership and become competitive in Show Hunter Classes. Sophie hopes to meet lots of new like-minded horsey friends and have lots of fun with Griff.
Auckland - Marcie Downs
Bay of Plenty - Abby Hindmarch
Abby Hindmarch
Abby is year 8 at Whakatane Intermediate School. Abby has been riding for 5 years, and first started competing in 2019 at local events such as dressage and low level pony club events. This year she has entered Tauranga Show Jumping Comps and also One Day Events,
and dressage. Abby, loves show jumping and one day events!
Abby rides Huey a 13 year old, 15.2 bay stationbred gelding. Abby and Huey have been a combination for just over a year. Abby very kindly lends Huey to her local Riding for the Disabled to use while she is at school so many other children get to enjoy him.
Abby’s goals for this season are to compete up to 1m showjumping and to learn about and compete in showhunter. Abby also wants to be able to learn to ride with more control and leg aids and get Huey working consistently with an adjustable stride.
Canterbury - Tessa Nichols
Tessa Nichols
Tessa is 13 years old, in year 8 at Heaton Normal Intermediate. Tessa has been riding for five years and rides Quinn a 12 year old, 15.2 crossbreed mare. Tessa and Quinn are new to jumping. This season Tessa and Quinn want to learn as much as possible about jumping, get out competing as well as develop their partnership together and most importnatly have loads of fun!
Central Districts - Taylor Lane
Central and Southern Hawkes Bay - Viggo Pedersen
Viggo Pedersen
Viggo is 13 years old and attends Lindisfarne College in Hastings. He has been riding since he was 4 years old, been a member of Central Hawkes Bay Pony Club for two years.
Viggo’s equine is Miss Mileystar a 10 year old mare, they have been teamed up for 2 months. Viggo and Miss Mileystar’s goals for this season are to compete up to 95cm, take part in local A&P shows. The ESNZ Rising Star Scholarship is a fabulous chance to enable Viggo to get a really great start to his show jumping and show hunter career.
Gisborne - Ella-Rose Hockey
Ella-Rose Hockey
Ella-Rose and her pony Eskada have been together for a year and really enjoy jumping.
Ella is from a non horsey background and her family are all learning together. Ella-Rose has regular lessons with Kirsty McLean.
They have competed at local sports days and last year were Reserve Champion Hunter at the Gisborne Pony Club Sports. They are currently jumping 80cm rounds but are looking to step up to 90cm shortly.
Ella and her family love sharing their horses with friends who come for rides.
Marlborough - Georgina Musgrove
Georgina Musgrove
Georgina is 10 years old, attends Renwick School and is Year 5. Georgina has been riding since she was 5 years old and has been partnered with Quest for a year and a half now.
Georgina and Quest started in first ridden classes but have found the love jumping!
Nelson - Maria O'Conner
Maria O’Conner
Maria is 12 years old, lives in Mahana in the Tasman district and belongs to the Motueka Pony Club. She has been riding for two and a half years and has recently found her new best friend forever- the gorgeous Moonspirit Treasure or Sugar as she is known at home. Sugar is a 143cm 12 year old Mare.
Maria and Sugar recently entered their first ODE – run by the Motueka and Nelson Bays Pony Clubs – where they competed in their first ever show jumping round together and went clear at 80cm.
Maria’s goal this season is to work hard to compete in show jumping rounds at 80-90 cm at this season’s A&P shows around the Top of the South and registered shows run by Nelson Show Jumping.
Maria’s focus is show jumping and her dream is to one day represent NZ in the show jumping ring! She knows this will take a lot of very hard work but is committed and willing to do all she can to improve her skills as a rider. Maria is VERY excited to be mentored by Peita Milne at Nelson Show Jumping and knows this scholarship will be of great benefit in kicking off her show jumping career!
Northern Hawkes Bay - Grace Cooney
Grace Cooney
Grace is 13 years old, in year 9 at Wairoa College. Grace has been a member of Wairoa Pony Club for many years, she also hunts with Mahia Hunt Inc. and has fun competing at local sports meetings.
Grace rides Dancing Star known as Stars at home. Stars is a 15.2 dapple grey 6 year old, home bred East Coast mare. Grace along with the help of her Mum and stepfather broke her in, with Grace doing most of the training. Together they have enjoyed farm rides, pig hunting, and attended the Gisborne winter jumping days and local events including Wairoa Pony Club rallies. They have been jumping 80-90 cm. Stars has personality plus and loves to eat and drink anything on offer!
Northland - Tabitha Moselen
Otago - Kaitlyn Bremner
Kaitlyn is 14 years old and has been riding since she was just two!
Kaitlyn attends Taieri college and rides Calicomoon (Cali). This is Kaitlyn and Cali’s second season together.
Kaitlyn’s goal this season is to gain confidence and continue to build the partnership she has with Cali, with the main goal to be jumping 95cm together at the end of the season.
South Canterbury North Otago - Willow Cleghorn
Willow Cleghorn
Willow is 16 years old, attends Timaru Girls High School and is in year 11. Willow has been riding since she was 6 years old, competing in RTR and working hunter classes at A&P shows during the last season.
Willow’s mount is L.P.G, known at home as Gem. Gem is a 158cm, 12 year old grey Swedish WB mare. Willow has been a teamed with Gem for a year now.
Southland - Hannah Price
Hannah Price
Hannah has grown up around horses and has been riding since the age of 2. Hannah’s mum, Sophie also rides and trains racehorses in Winton.
Hannah has experience in a range of competitions including pony club, showing, eventing and show jumping.
Hannah and her new pony Zinny are already developing a strong partnership after only being together since March. She is also very proud of her pony Zinny whom she helped break in and has done everything on him from playing game, showing, eventing and showjumping him.
Taihape - Hannah Gudsell
Taranaki - Heidi Fenton
Waikato - Charlotte Cherry
Charlotte Cherry
Charlotte is in year 6 at Hinuera School. She started riding when she was 3, when her fmaily moved to NZ from Australia.
Charlotte got her first pony which got her out competing at A & P Shows in first year ridden. Charlotte brought her pony, Lilly (Onika Brilliant Reflection) in August 2019.
Lilly was only 4 when Charlotte got her and very green, but Charlotte and Lily have come a long way in our first year together, doing Pony Club, Pony Club competitions, training days and clinics.
Wairarapa - Briar Wilkinson
Briar Wilkinson
Briar Wilkinson is 11 years old and in year 7 at Hadlow Primary School. Her pony is called Luna Gold but at home goes by Star, she is a 14.2hh sport horse palomino mare.
Briar has ridden since she was 2 years old; she have competed in dressage, RTR, eventing, show hunter, show jumping and has represented the Wairarapa Pony Club at the Zone Games in Foxton this year.
Briar has also been selected for the Wairarapa Pony Club show hunter team to compete at Foxton in October 2020.
Waitemata - Nikita Van Zuilen
Nikita Van Zuilen
Nikita is a year 13 student and Westlake Girls High School. She has been riding for 5 years and competing for 2 years. She has previously competed in non-registered show jumping up to 1m. Nikita rides He’s a Charmer or William as he’s known at home, a 10 year old bay gelding.
Nikitas goals are to get out and compete in registered jumping successfully at 1.05m. Nikita will be mentored by Georgia Lawrie who has also offered to donated some lessons to Nikita to get her started for the season.
Wellington - Mikayla Vanessi
Our 2019-2020 Stars