Young Rider Championships - Area 1 USEA 2023

The year 2020 brought many changes, and it is during this time that the USEF pivoted the Eventing North American Youth Championships to the Adequan®/USEF Eventing Youth Team Challenge. We are extremely grateful to all of the hosts of the Eventing North American Youth Championships over the past 40+ years. The Championships provided invaluable experience, memories and opportunities for all involved. The 2021 Youth Team Challenge concept allowed over 60 athletes from nine areas to compete in team competitions throughout the year. We are appreciative to be able to offer these opportunities to the athletes, but in review of the program the Youth Team Challenge Task Force and Eventing Sport Committee felt that returning to one long -format Championship competition was the best way forward.

The USEF Young Rider Eventing Championship will award three championship titles: CCI1*-L, CCI2*-L, and CCI3*-L.

Area 1 is aiming to send athletes/teams to compete in each division.

Candidates will be evaluated throughout the summer by the Area 1 selectors: John Bourgoin, Stephie Baer, Jane Hamlin and Bevin Dugan along with team coach, Jan Byyny.

Meet the Area 1 Selectors:

Stephie Baer has been teaching riding, training horses and competing in three day events and combined training events for over 35 years. She has trained numerous green horses, including several from green to 3 and 4 star levels. She is based out of Course Brook Farm located in Sherborn, MA. Stephie has competed through the advanced level, including 4 star events at Burghley CIC**** (England) and Rolex Kentucky CCI****. She also has competed at Fair Hill CCI***, Thirelston Castle CIC*** (Scotland), Essex CCI**, Radnor CCI**, Bromont CCI** (Canada) and Quetero CCI** (Mexico). She has won Advanced divisions at Fair Hill, Morven Park and Southern Pines. She was short listed for the 1998 World Championships and trained with the American Team in England. She has also participated in several USET training sessions. Along with being a working student and employee of Bruce Davidson for over four years, Stephie has also has trained with Capt. Mark Phillips, Jack LeGoff, Rick Sullivan, Lauren Stevens, Kathy Connolly, Sandy Osborne and Arlene Full. She has attended clinics with Lucinda Green, Joey Darby, Ann Kursinsky, Jane Savoy, Sandy Pflueger, Eric Horgan and Jimmy Wofford.

Jane Hamlin is an active event and dressage rider, trainer, and coach based at Pirouette Farm in Norwich, Vermont. Her positive attitude, with an emphasis on teaching good basics, has produced successful riders at the beginner level to the Olympic level. She enjoys teaching both adult amateurs as well as young riders and is a popular clinician teaching at such clinics as the Area 1 Young Rider camp and the Junior Horsemanship Clinic at GMHA. In addition to her teaching, she brings along nice young horses with careful preparation and education. Jane holds both a USEF Event and Dressage judge’s license as well as an FEI International Eventing Judge license.

Based in Vermont and Aiken, South Carolina, Bevin O’Reilly Dugan is a veteran 3* eventer, USEA ECP-Certified Instructor, and USDF Bronze and Silver medalist. Her methodical process creates a strong element of trust between horse and rider, which inspires a greater level of commitment and passion from everyone she reaches. Her creative use of classical principles combined with kind and contemporary training strategies results in confident horses and riders who find success in the show ring as well as at home.

Growing up in New Brunswick, Canada, and northern Maine along the U.S./Canadian border, John Bourgoin‘s riding life began with trail riding and competing in local Western horse shows. Whileattending college in Vermont, Bourgoin was introduced to the local hunter/jumper scene where he spent time learning how to ride in an English saddle and proceeded to enter the world of jumping horses. While boarding a horse at a local stable, Bourgoin also beganvolunteering and helping out with the Charlotte Pony Club. After nearly 40 years, he continues to be one of their main instructors and volunteers yearly for their annual Horse Trials. Bourgoin is still an active competitor and has developed and competed his ownhorses through every national level of the sport. He has also trained and coached riders from Beginner Novice to Advanced. For the last 25 years, he has been very involved in the Area I Young Riderprogram and several of his students have represented Area I as team members, earning team and individual medals at the North American Youth Championships. He continues to serve as a team selector and clinician for the program. In 2022, Bourgoin was the recipient of the Mike Huber Award from the USEA Foundation.Having retired from public school teaching after 38 years, Bourgoin now has the opportunity to work full-time with clients and theirhorses. Bourgoin and his wife, Alice, own and operate ArbrookFarm in North Ferrisburgh, Vermont.

Meet the Coach:

Jan Byyny owns and manages Surefire Farm, a busy lesson, sales and training business in Purcellville, Va. and actively competes at all levels of eventing. Consistently a top ranked international rider, Jan’s career highlights include representing the U.S. at the Pan American

Championships, where she won team gold and individual bronze, being a member of the Aachen World Equestrian Games squad, competing on U.S. Equestrian teams at Malmo, Sweden and Luhmuhlen, Germany, and being selected as a team alternate for the Athens Olympics. Jan also has numerous top ten placings at Rolex Kentucky, Foxhall, Jersey Fresh, Bromont and Morven Park CCIs, and won the 2013 USEF National 3-star Championship at Fair Hill. In addition, she has competed at Burghley, Badminton and Blenheim in England and Pau in France.

Jan is active in the United States Eventing Association as an advisor to the Young Riders and Juniors Committee, is a Level IV ICP instructor, serves on the United States Equestrian Federation’s Eventing Sport Committee as an Elected Athlete and in 2017 was named a USEF Eventing Selector.