Montana Breust says winning the Open Large Hack Championship at the Nationals with homebred Anaki Park Fernando is undoubtedly a career highlight. While it wasn’t an easy road with ‘Dave’, Montana learnt a lot on the journey – and as it turns out, it was a path that led them to where they needed to be.
“Honestly, I still haven’t really wrapped my head around it,” says Montana Breust of claiming the Open Large Hack championship with Anaki Park Fernando at the 2023 EA Australasian Show Horse and Rider Championships (the ‘Nationals’).
The night before the class, 25-year-old Montana had been flicking through photos of some of the other horses in the class to show her boyfriend just how amazing they were. “I was not expecting our little homebred boy to win the class – not at all,” she explains.
Standing in the line-up, she was named the winning owner rider – and with a glance around and some fast maths, she realised they might have actually placed overall. “I had a feeling I may have placed, and so I was already a little bit emotional. And then when they called out Kate Halliday and Kalimna Quick Hit as third and I knew she was an owner rider as well, I thought, ‘Oh my goodness!’ I was already crying then.” Elizabeth Krog and Warrawee Impresareeo were named the Reserve Champions, and then finally Montana and Anaki Park Fernando were called out as the Champions.
“My win at the Nationals is absolutely my career highlight,” says Montana, adding that while she was surprised to win, she always thought the horse was special. “We’ve always thought that he was beautiful from when he was born. He was just a leggy, spider baby foal. He had legs for days and he was black and was beautiful. He was the perfect mix of his mum and dad. Having bred him, we always thought that we might have been a little bit biased… I’m glad to see that some other people agree and also think he’s beautiful!”
‘WHAT’S SHOWING?’
Growing up in country New South Wales, Montana’s mother and aunty always had horses and used to breed Appaloosas and Quarter Horses. “I’ve been around horses my whole life. I had my first pony before I was walking – a Shetland, and she was a little devil!” explains Montana.
Starting out at Pony Club Montana enjoyed a variety of disciplines, and then when she was 11 years old she received a galloway named Magic. “He was a little Pony Club eventing pony. He was beautiful and I started going to all these Pony Club events and everyone said, ‘Oh, have you thought about showing this pony?’ And we said, ‘What’s showing?’
“We went and bought the first turnout gear Mum could find on Facebook, and we took Magic out to all the local shows. He started winning, and I really fell in love with showing from there. It’s been about 14 years now that I’ve been showing,” says Montana.
Following Magic, Montana had a beautiful Warmblood mare named AATC Rosanna, aka Rosie. “She did a lot for us and was amazing,” she says. While Montana had a lot of fun with Rosie and enjoyed a taste of the big shows, Montana says her success with the mare was mostly confined to the smaller shows and she never qualified her for any open classes at the big events. “Once a year, I would occasionally snag a runner-up at one of the qualifying shows and manage to get into my rider class at the Grand National (SHCA Grand National Saddle Horse & Rider Championships). Rosie did so much in terms of teaching me a lot about showing, and I also learned to lose very well with her because we didn’t win much at all,” laughs Montana.
“She did a lot for us
and was amazing.”
On the coaching front, in her younger years Montana trained a lot with Les Friend. “He did a lot for me and my riding when I had Magic, and I wouldn’t have had all those small successes that I had with Rosie in my rider classes without him. As I got a little bit older, I trained a little bit more locally with Sue Walker and she helped me out a lot with my young horses, including Dave.”
ANAKI PARK
During their childhood, Montana’s sister Kiah also rode, and together they christened their family property Anaki Park. “It’s actually a mix of the last three letters of my name and the first letters of my sister’s name,” explains Montana.
“It was a cute little thing we made up when we were younger, we had shirts made and everything! And then in 2014 my aunty decided she was going to take up breeding Warmbloods in the Hunter Valley, and she asked us what we would think of her using the name Anaki Park. She got a sign made, and then we thought, ‘Wow, one day when we breed our horses and we’re riding them, they’re going to have that as part of their name’. It’s just crazy to think that we’ve come that far.”
Out of her aunt’s broodmare, Anaki Wenona, and by the stallion Finest, Dave was one of two foals bred in the stud’s first year.
“We had the pick of the two: George or Dave. We tossed and turned for a long time, as we couldn’t figure out which one we wanted to go with. We ended up going with Dave because we knew he’d be taller (George ended up 15.2 hands, while Dave is 16.2½ hands); I wanted something tall, and Dave was black as well, so that was another thing! Mum and I drove up to the Hunter Valley, put him on the float, and he made the nine-hour trip on his own down to our place in central southern New South Wales. He’s been with us ever since.”
A DIFFICULT JOURNEY
Anyone with horses knows the journey is rarely straightforward. When he was four, Dave headed off to the breakers and during one of his first rides under saddle he had an accidental trip and fall. He pulled up lame, and so headed home for a break. Once he appeared sound again, he went back to complete his breaking-in – but unfortunately within a week he was showing signs of lameness again, and so it was off to the vets for a thorough investigation.
“The vets realised over a three-month period of him being in the paddock and between X-rays, that he had developed a quite significant bone spur in one of his fetlocks,” recalls Montana. The consensus was that Dave’s ailment wasn’t something that typically responded well to surgery, and it was decided that the best option was to turn him out for 12 months and hope for the best. Montana was told not to get her hopes up, as the vet had only seen one comparable case where the horse was able to eventually return to full ridden work.
“I was told we might just end up with a beautiful paddock ornament and that was really hard to hear, because we had watched him grow in our paddock and I had been dreaming of the day that I would get to ride him… hearing that news, that was really hard.
“We brought him home and turned him out in the paddock… after 12 months he was running around like a lunatic and looking like absolutely nothing was wrong with him. We decided to take him back to the vets to get him X-rayed again, just to see what was happening. The X-rays showed that the bone spur had arrested and softened up, it wasn’t sharp anymore – and he wasn’t lame. So that was really, really exciting.”
A LATE START
By this point, Dave was six years old and was yet to commence any serious ridden work – let alone attend a competition.
“We didn’t really know where to go from there. It was hard because we didn’t really have anyone living close to send our horses too. George, the horse that was born the same year as Dave, had been to Jess and Rhys Stone at J & R Equestrian to be sold and we were really impressed with how that worked out. We decided to send Dave to them because I didn’t really want to jump on him after only being half broken in and then having a year off!”
Dave went to Jess and Rhys for six weeks to get him started, and Montana credits them with getting the ball rolling. “We went and picked him up after the six weeks and I had a ride. I was watching Jess ride him, and I thought, ‘Oh my goodness. That is my horse!’ I couldn’t believe it… seeing him standing there in the cross ties, I thought he was just so beautiful. I couldn’t believe I was going to get to take him home.
“He was definitely a rough diamond, but Jess said he was a lovely horse and a comfortable ride. She was impressed and thought he’d be great if I could develop a bond with him; she recognised from the outset that he was a very sensitive creature!”
INTO THE DEEP END
“Dave’s first show was 5 November 2021. He was six and it was the NSW Country Hack Championships. We decided to throw him in the deep end and see how he handled it, and the first day he was an absolute mess. He could not do anything at all; he was a super anxious horse,” recalls Montana.
“Just having horses and ponies everywhere and being at a new venue… he had only ever really been off the property maybe three times, and he just didn’t cope that first day of his first show. We managed to get through that day of Newcomer classes, but I think the best ribbon we got was a third place from three horses.”
The next day, Dave coped a little better after a night to relax in his stable, and he finished third in the Open. “I had so many compliments from the judges, and people watching were saying, ‘He’s amazing. Where did you get him? Where did this horse come from?’ That was crazy, at his first show.”
From there, it was onward and upwards. In his first six months under saddle, Dave qualified for and won the Open Large Hack class and Child’s Large Hack class at the 2020/21 Nationals (the first Nationals following the pandemic), the latter with Becky Roberson in the saddle. It was his second ever show.
“In 2022, Dave competed at his first Grand National as a bumbling baby where he gave the judge the most beautiful ride and ended up fifth in the Open Large Hack class,” recalls Montana.
Last year, Dave was Champion Novice Large Hack at Canberra Royal and also finished second in the Open class. “That exceeded my expectations,” says Montana of their biggest success prior to the 2023 Nationals. “It’s really crazy to think how much he’s achieved in the last 12 months. And the best part is, since he was brought back into work, he has not had an unsound day.”
LEARNING CURVE
“I’ve learned an awful lot about young horses through Dave, especially because he was such a tricky one and he still can be quite tricky, even though he’s come such a long way. When you’re taking young horses to their first shows, it is really important to make sure you have good basics at home first and that you’ve got a solid bond and connection. I think that’s really, really important, because if you don’t have that and your horse finds themselves in a situation where they feel unsafe, a little bit uncomfortable, or concerned or worried, it all comes back to that connection. You need to be able to reassure them and have things in place where you can for example, pop them on a 10-minute circle to regain the connection. That’s something that has really helped me with Dave.”
Montana says it’s important, especially with sensitive horses like Dave, not to over-face them. “A lot of people recommend driving them around to every show early on, and I think that works for a lot of horses, but the sensitive ones like Dave who are anxious and easily overwhelmed, having that really solid foundation and basic education first is important.
“We realised we had
to take it really slowly.”
“Making sure that they become exposed to different environments is a big thing, but you can also over-face them. With Dave we realised we had to take it really slowly. He didn’t go to any agricultural shows in this first season, because after that first show I just knew the atmosphere would be too much for him. It was really important to me that he had a really solid foundation before I put him in that situation.
“Dave is also not a horse that you can lunge a lot and work the energy out of, as he runs purely on adrenaline. For me, it’s all about the connection and making sure that you’ve got that really solid basic foundation.”
A LOVE OF SHOWING
So what is it that Montana loves about showing? “All of the costume and the preparation involved… it sounds a bit silly that I would love that so much, but I just love the whole night before, getting them washed, clipped and plaited. Everything has to be perfect: your jacket has to be dry cleaned and everything has to look amazing for it all to come together. You can have an amazing horse and be an incredible rider, but a big part of showing is about how the whole thing comes together. I think I found a great appreciation for all the attention to detail required in the show ring.
“The other thing I love is the incredible people that I’ve met through the sport. I’ve made some of my closest friends through showing that I never would have met otherwise. When we had Magic and I eventually sold my first show outfit, the people who bought it… their daughter is now one of my closest friends. I’ve made friends from all over the country, and some of them to this day are my closest and some of the most loyal, amazing friends I could ever have.”
Montana says that while some people have a negative perception of showing and the perceived politics involved, she believes that her win at the Nationals with Dave shows that lesser-known combinations can step up and win at the bigger shows.
“I never won a lot with Rosie, and I’ve been doing this for quite a long time now… you have to find the right horse that you really click with and that seems to be the case for Dave and I. We just get along so well, and we know each other inside out and back to front,” says Montana.
“Riders who are interested in showing but are a bit scared to take the leap for fear they don’t belong or aren’t good enough… don’t think about that. There are positives to take away from every show, no matter where you place. And if I can win at the Nationals, anyone can!”
MEANT TO BE
“Aside from how beautiful he is, I think Dave’s best attribute is how trusting he is. He thrives off having a connection and a bond. If you break his trust, it is hard to get it back, but once he trusts you he’ll give you everything. He’s amazing like that. I love how much he loves people,” says Montana.
Dave had a well-earned break following his win at the Nationals, and now Montana is excited to look ahead to their 2024 goals. “I’m really looking forward to doing the Grand National and the Sydney Royal Easter Show. I’ve always dreamt of riding Dave at Sydney Royal.”
While it hasn’t been an easy road, Montana believes that everything they we went through with Dave was meant to be. “I don’t think he would have been half as successful if he’d come out that first year like we originally planned… initially we were going to have him broken in, take him through the summer at home, and then bring him out the following year.
“It actually worked out perfectly for him to have the 12 months off after being partially broken in to go out in the paddock and be a horse and have another year of maturity. Everything really fell into place, which isn’t something I’ve ever experienced before. Prior to Dave, I’d never realised how important taking that extra time can be for some horses. He really needed that extra time… it’s all worked out exactly the way it was supposed to.” EQ
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