Welcome to my UA World: Morrison Coaches Equestrian Program

By Derek Hooper
Photos by Matthew Wood

As two horses circle her in the ring, Ashley Morrison voices recommendations to the athletes atop them. Most comments relate to posture or pace, but some provide insight into what the horse will do next.

For Morrison, coach of The University of Alabama’s equestrian program, it’s all part of a normal afternoon of practice at River Oaks Farm.

The program competes in the Intercollegiate Horse Show Association, or IHSA, against 16 other schools in the region. It travels to shows with its 28 riders and divvies them up among eight classes.

The schools then pool their horses and draw the names of the horses that will be assigned to each rider. Whichever school performs best in each class gets a point, and, at the end of the meet, the school with the most points wins.

Morrison says judges focus on the riders and how they respond to the horses. The riders have to memorize a course map and the amount of strides between certain jumps before getting on a horse with which they are unfamiliar.

“We’ve been first or second this year in just about every competition we’ve participated in,” says Morrison. “There are over 400 schools that are doing the same kind of thing that we do, so it’s a big deal.”

Morrison began riding when she was a young girl and has been riding for over 30 years. She says she started for fun but soon realized she was drawn to the competitive aspect of horse riding. Through high school and college, she competed nationally in horse showing competitions.

While in college at UA, Morrison was a member of the equestrian team, which was considered a club sport at that time.

“There was a group of us who decided we would make a team and travel to compete,” says Morrison. “We didn’t have much, but we would go, and we actually hung in there against tough competition.”

About a year ago, Morrison was approached about becoming coach of the program. She owns a local farm in Tuscaloosa where she teaches, coaches and trains in much the same way she does for UA.

“That’s how I’ve made a living since I graduated from Alabama,” says Morrison. “Now, coaching a college team, it’s a really cool, different way of looking at the horse world.”

Morrison also teaches a class in the kinesiology department at UA. In the course, students learn about horses and riding gear before learning how to ride.

About 20 yards from the ring sits a barn containing, on this day, 15 additional horses. Most of the horses in the program are warm bloods, and many of them are imported from Germany or other European countries.

A warm blood, Morrison says, is a cross between a draft horse and a thoroughbred, so it’s heavier and sturdier than the average thoroughbred but has the bloodline and agility for which the breed is known.

The horses can weigh anywhere from 1,000 to 1,600 pounds. On average, they eat between six to eight pounds of grain a day, in addition to hay and grass.

Most of the horses in the program are donations. Initially, they stay at River Oaks Farm for 30 days while the program tries them out. Coaches make sure a horse fits in the program, ensuring its safety, and that it can perform equestrian tasks. It goes through a veterinarian checkup and, after board approval, the horse is accepted into the program.

Students in the program perform community service through TROT, which is the local therapeutic program in Tuscaloosa. Morrison says the UA equestrian program is planning to begin offering therapeutic services to special populations.

“There’s so much to offer when it comes to therapeutic riding, whether it’s physical or behavioral, because there’s something about a horse that really looks into your soul,” explains Morrison.

Lindsey Cayce, a junior majoring in human development and human studies at UA, is one of the 28 riders in the program. She cites the equestrian program as one of the major reasons she came to UA and says her relationship with coach Morrison has flourished over the past few years.

“Outside of the ring, she’s definitely someone you know you can always call if you need anything,” she says. “That obviously helps in the ring, when you know you’ve got someone behind you that you can trust and count on when the competition gets intense.”

The Alabama Equestrian Team is heading to Regionals in Auburn March 4. The nine riders qualified to compete and their events are Courtney Poist, Open Fences and Flat; Lindsey Cayce, Intermediate Fences; Clare Ols, Novice Flat; Kasey Emm, Class 2B Walk Trot Canter; Elizabeth Connell, Class 2B Walk Trot Canter; Gabrielle Covey, Class 2B Walk Trot Canter; Emily Elia, Class 2B Walk Trot Canter; Kelsey Martin, Class 2B Walk Trot Canter; and Caelan Douglas, Class 1 Walk Trot.

The IHSA has over 10,000 riders from 412 colleges in 39 regions across the U.S. The top 400 riders compete against each other at nationals in May of each year.