Kendal Lehari & Learning to Ride Before She Was Born

Her parents, Gwen and Rein, own Reindalyne Farm in Uxbridge, and her mother rode throughout her pregnancy. When Kendal was five, she and her brother, Tristan, got a pony named Dallas that she foxhunted and took to fairs and Pony Club. Coached by her mom, Kendal graduated to horses and as both her parents evented, she developed a similar passion.

A Thoroughbred that had been too slow to race arrived at their barn as a sales prospect when Kendal was 16. Daily Edition failed his vetting, but she got along so well with “Ed” that the family decided to keep him. Little did Kendal suspect that she would be piloting the chestnut gelding around the Rolex CCI**** course a decade later.

“Ed and I started out with Pony Club shows as well as horse trials,” she says. “In our first season together, we did a couple of pre-training and training events. In 2004, I upgraded him to preliminary, because he was so bold on cross-country and almost needed that height to back him off.”

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Kendal was aiming for the Young Riders team in 2005, but after the pair did their first FEI event at Bromont in the CIC*, Ed developed seedy toe and his hoof wall to be removed up to the coronet band. His competition future seemed doubtful, so while Ed had time off in 2006, Kendal took her mother’s Thoroughbred, Understudy, to the North American Young Riders Championships, where she won individual and team gold medals. She started bringing Ed back in 2007 and by the end of that year he finished the Wits End CCI* on his dressage score.

In spite of that, Kendal considered selling him as a jumper. “Dressage is one area he’s ADD and he’s just never totally clicked,” Kendal explains. “She thought he’d never get the scores to be competitive at the advanced level, but her dressage coach at the time, Karin Davis, convinced her to keep him because of his superior jumping skills. ‘His dressage is a lot better now, but it’s never easy.”

The pair moved up to advanced by 2010 and last year were named to the Canadian Team short list (Kendal was long-listed with her two-star mount, Totally Frank). While aiming for Rolex, Ed suffered a tear in his deep digital flexor tendon and needed time off. This time, Kendal considered retiring him.

But Ed has a knack for beating the odds, whether it’s injury or conformation (his feet are small and one foot is clubbed). This year, he and Kendal made it to Kentucky, where they posted the fastest cross-country time and placed 19th in their first four-star. “This horse has the biggest heart out of any horse I know and always tries his best,” she says. “His poor conformation and his past have not stopped him, and I couldn’t ask for a better horse to share this experience with.”

Following graduation from the University of Guelph in 2009 with a bachelor of science honours degree, Kendal returned to Reindalyne to work alongside her mother, coaching students and developing her own string of five horses, as well as sales prospects. Gwen continues to coach and still competes at horse trials. “My mom has always helped me and we still help each other,” says Kendal. “We also work with Sally Sainsbury for show jumping, and I’m working with Jacquie Brooks on dressage and also with team coach Clayton Fredericks.”

Kendal is hoping to earn a spot on the Canadian team going to the 2014 World Equestrian Games in Normandy, France, and will concentrate on improving Ed’s dressage this fall before aiming for a return to Rolex next spring. She also sees a bright future for eight-year-old Totally Frank, who she’ll upgrade to advanced level in August. “He’s another one that’s pretty cool,” she says. “He’s very bold and the dressage will be there. Height isn’t an issue for him; it will just be a matter of getting him to understand the questions.”