Try @ TXST

Giselle - Studio (00:04):
Hi everybody, my name's Giselle, and I'm the digital marketing strategist here at Texas State. You're listening to Try @ Texas State, and we're talking to the Texas State Equestrian team. The Texas State Equestrian team trains at Sunny Fox Farms in Buda, which is about 30 minutes away from the Texas State campus in San Marcos. When we drive up, we're surrounded by fields, we're on a dirt road. There's dust flying everywhere, and we see horses, they're in each of the pastures. Some are eating out of the hay bales, some are being ridden. There's a lesson going on. It's the advanced girls. They're the ones who compete. They're galloping, they're trotting, they're being coached.

Katherine (00:51):
My name is Katherine Deichmann. I am the coach of Texas State Equestrian team for the last, um, eight years, and I'm the owner of Sunny Fox Farms that we ride out of.

Giselle - Interview (01:01):
So how long has the equestrian team been here at Texas State?

Katherine (01:05):
Consecutively? Probably about 12, uh, 13 years. Um, that it's been going nine with me, so. Wow. Yeah.

Giselle - Interview (01:12):
Yeah. I didn't, I didn't know. Nobody knows . I know, that's what I was gonna say. So how did you get involved with Texas State to begin with?

Hannah (01:21):
Um, so I just kind of looked it up at my old barn I used to ride at.

Giselle - Interview (01:26):
So that's Hannah.

Hannah (01:27):
Hi, I'm Hannah Patterson. I'm a captain on the Texas State Equestrian Team. I'm a sophomore at Texas State, and I'm majoring in exercise sports science with a concentration of athletic training. A girl went and rode for UT, and so she was talking about that, and this was when I was so like much younger, maybe going into like middle school. Um, and I just kind of remembered it, and one of my friends like was joining a hockey team that the school had, and I was like, oh, if they have like hockey teams, like I wonder if they have this. Like I know UT did, like, I want to kind of figure out if this is still something I can do. And then I looked it up, and like I found the Instagram, and I found the website and just kind of deep dived into it. Just showed up at the barn one day and was like, “Hey, can I, can I do this?” And you were like, “Yeah, come out next week.” And I was like, solid.

Giselle - Interview (02:10):
What does it take to become a part of this team?

Katherine (02:13):
My biggest things that are important when I see a rider wanting to come in is just drive and the want to learn. Um, you know, the cool thing about the the, the team here at Texas State and IHSA, the organization that we work through is, and it's open for anybody. You have never had to touch a horse or ridden a horse before. And so as long as I have somebody that comes in and goes, “Hey, I just wanna learn, I want to get better,” that's what I, that's what I look for the best is that drive and, and passion to just be a, a good student. You know, it's, it's a good way to still work on your character as a student in the school, but get a little bit more fun and free time out of it and, you know, getting to be a part of the horses and stuff. So, yeah.

Giselle - Interview (02:52):
How do you think that riding horses or just being a part of this team in general benefits a student at Texas State?

Katherine (02:58):
Oh girl, I could go on for hours about it. Please. Uh, you know, horseback riding in general, you know, being on the team, of course as a college student, um, I think that it is a really good outlet, but being in the horse world in general, it builds so much, um, independence, responsibility. You know, you're not just caring for a basketball or a baseball. You, you've got an animal with a mind that you've got to work with. Um, it's really good for your own feelings and intuition and stuff. Your horses, um, even the horses that, you know, teach people and, and can take on the beginner rider, they feel every aspect of what you are feeling that day. And so it's kind of a thing is when you go to the barn, you want it to be your happy face. You let go of all those issues and those problems and hardships that you're having, not only for yourself, but because your horse really picks up on that. And if you're having a bad day, your horse is probably not gonna have a very good day either. They, they're so intuitive. Um, and just feel you so much that, that that's a huge, a huge part of it. So helps you, um, just kind of be a little bit better of a person. I think, you know, you've just gotta kind of think about others, whether it's a horse, um, instead of just yourself and, and sometimes bettering yourself, betters the other people around you or the horses around you.

Hannah (04:15):
Riding horses is a very individualized team sport, right? Like we all use each other, we benefit from each other. The whole team competes with other teams to grow, but also like you're riding with an animal and you're riding with like this one thing that can't communicate with you the way you can communicate with someone who's like on your football team, right? Right. So when you're having a bad day, being able to like put that aside and like work through that with your horse or like your horse might be having a bad day and they're just not feeling it and having to work through that. I think it builds like a different level of communication that you wouldn't have been able to have with like someone on your basketball team or something where if you're having a bad day, you can kind of let yourself deal with that and then the team can kind of pick up the slack. But you can't always do that here because like Katherine said, like they are very intuitive and like they know. And there have been many times where like, I have come out to the barn just to cry cuz I needed like a good little like release like it. Yeah, no, for sure. And you know, the horses out here just will sit there and let you love on them all day and they'll take it.

Giselle - Interview (05:10):
The more and more you guys are describing them, the more and more they sound like people I know

.

Katherine (05:14):
Yeah, it's very true. It's very true.

Giselle - Interview (05:16):
So you mentioned IHSA, can you tell me what that stands for?

Katherine (05:19):
Um, so IHSA is the um, Intercollegiate Horse Show Association and it was started by a man named Bob Cacchione. Um, he put the organization together to really make, um, riding in college affordable.

Giselle - Interview (05:34):
Is it on a weekend that you go to these competitions?

(05:36):
Yeah.

(05:36):
Where is it? Um, can you guys walk me through that process? Is there like finals, and I just wanna know about it.

Katherine (05:42):
So we leave on a Thursday. Um, our team's pretty big. We have a lot of horses, so we bring a lot of horses to the horse shows. So the girls are not just, um, not just focusing on their riding and their showing, they're also having to take care of horses in that aspect of it. Uh, we'll get there, get all the horses set up and their stalls with water and hay and everything. They'll ride them, uh, Friday and Saturday are our undergrad shows. And then Sunday is our regional championship. So if we have students that point out of their division, meaning win enough ribbons, then they get to go to regionals and the first, uh, first place and second place rider regionals gets to go onto zone finals and then same thing gets to go onto national finals.

Hannah (06:23):
Right. So it's not just, okay, I'm gonna go out and ride this horse I may have never ridden before. Which is how I just say kind of works is you get a horse like drawn out of a hat basically, and that's just the horse you get to show on. Um, no warmups, just go out and have fun and like try your best. And so it's more of a horsemanship aspect of like what it's really about for us too, being able to bring horses there.

Giselle - Interview (06:44):
So you're judged not only on your riding, but how well your horse does?

Katherine (06:49):
Kind of to a point? Yeah, yeah. It's a little bit, it's, it's that partnership of, you know, you it is, it's, it's literally drawing out of a hat. You, uh, you go to the draw table and you draw a card or you know, we like to use little fun rubber ducks or something and have a number on the bottom and you match it up with a horse and then you get on that horse and you have a handler. So somebody on the ground that leads that horse around while you're on. Um, you're not allowed to pick up the reins and and figure out how to steer them or stop them. And when it's time for you to put the show on, they send you in the ring and you either go jump your course or do your flat class, which is just, um, walk trotting cantering with a group of people, but you don't get any warmup time on the horses. You don't, you get to watch them. Um, and that's kind of it. So it's a really, it's a really cool thing that teaches people not only sportsmanship, horsemanship. Yeah. Um, but yeah, just all in all, you know, handling hard situations better is a, is a huge part of it. And IHSA really makes you do that whether you want to or not. . Yeah.

Giselle - Interview (07:49):
Yeah.
(07:50):
That sounds...The way you describe it sounds nerve-wracking —
(07:51):
a little bit scary !
(07:53):
but also rewarding. Hannah, what keeps you coming back to doing these competitions and being a part of this team? Like what is, what does that drive for you?

Hannah (08:01):
It's just like pure bliss like, it's so fun, it's so freeing, um, and you're able to like achieve things and like have accomplishments that I wouldn't have been able to get outside of the barn, right? Like working on something that not everybody else might have the same like goals as me. Like we're all on different pages out here, but like we're all learning the same thing. And so reaching those is really fulfilling.

Giselle - Interview (08:22):
Can you guys tell me one of your favorite memories thus far being a part of this team?

Hannah (08:26):
Mine is probably from LSU last year, honestly. Like I think that was a big, like we team bond a lot on that trip cuz not only am I in a car with these girls for eight hours , um, twice. Yeah. But it's like we stay in like the same area. Like we stay in Airbnb together and you know, we're going to these shows at, you know, 6:30 in the morning to take care of these horses before everybody else gets there. And we're there working long hours so like, you know, we're going through these experiences together and we're sharing them and you know, it just allowed me to meet more people and like learn different sides of them, right. And there's a lot you can do in, in the eight-hour car ride. There's a lot of different music you can listen to. Like we had a blast, and it allowed me to bond with some of the girls who were, you know, upperclassmen who are still hanging around and allowed me to get to know a lot of the vets and build relationships with 'em. And so I'm really excited about that. So I think that was probably my favorite. It's just LSU as a whole just because it was so fun. It was just like a fever dream the whole time. Like the funny memes and the memories and inside jokes that we have from that trip are like insane. So

Giselle - Interview (09:25):
Yeah. You're, you're making me jealous. I wish they were gone on that trip. Now , she

Hannah (09:28):
Come with us.

Giselle - Interview (09:30):
My last question for both of you. If you could give any piece of advice to someone who's never touched a horse, never ridden a horse, wants to take lessons or wants to join your team, what would it be?

Hannah (09:40):
Try it.

Giselle - Interview (09:41):
Try it?

Hannah (09:41):
I think that is a very, well that's a very generic...

Giselle - Interview (09:43):
Very fitting for the name of this — Try @ Texas State.

Katherine (09:47):
Yeah, no, try it.

Hannah (09:48):
Try, just do it. Like, I, I really do think you should. A lot of people can be really nervous coming into it cause they are big animals and they do have minds of their own and you know, it can be kind of scary, and some people have bad experiences with it, but we have saints of horses out here, like they're wonderful, and the barn environment is really, really good. And I think it's just so rewarding, and there's a different type of fulfillment that you get when you're out here doing things and like achieving these other goals, and like, I think everyone should at least do it.

Katherine (10:14):
It's hard to push yourself, especially as a college student with so much on your plate. Um, you know, if you find yourself stuck or nervous or just not, you know, you can't find friends or you just can't find your niche, come try it. You get on one time and it it, it changes your life. It's, it's, I know that's silly, but it, it really can make a huge difference in, in how your whole college experience goes. For sure.

Giselle - Interview (10:36):
To wrap this up, can you guys tell us where people can find you? Like how can they contact you? How can they find you?

Hannah (10:42):
So we have our email, which is just Texas State Equestrian all spelled out @ gmail.com.

Katherine (10:47):
You can also go to Sunny Fox Farms llc.com, and there's a link to our Texas State Equestrian, um, website on there as well.

Giselle - Interview (10:55):
What's the Instagram handle?

Hannah (10:57):
So the Instagram is just TX and then the whole word "state" equestrian.

Giselle - Interview (11:01):
Thank you guys. Amazing job.

Katherine (11:02):
For coming out. Thank you guys for coming out.

Giselle - Studio (11:05):
A very special thank you to the Texas State Equestrian team for sharing their experiences with our listeners and for bringing us in to the world of horse riding. And thank you for listening to this episode of the Try @ Texas State Podcast. Make sure to tune in next time to learn more about something else you can try on campus at Texas State. And remember to follow us on Instagram, Twitter, Facebook, and YouTube at "T X S T". This podcast is a production of the Division of Marketing and Communications at Texas State University. Podcasts appearing on the Texas State University Network represent the views of the hosts and guests, not of Texas State University. Again, I'm your host Giselle Kowalski, and we'll see you next time. Bye, y'all.