The bond between horse and groom can be a powerful thing. For Tamiles “Tammy” Pezzim, that was evident at Saturday Night Lights for the $140,000 Southern Arches CSI3* Grand Prix, when she and her charge, ESI Ali, made their debut at the night class – and came away with the blue ribbon after Egypt’s Nayel Nassar steered the 10-year-old Irish Sport Horse gelding to victory. It was also Nayel’s first win under the lights at Wellington International.
“When you like the job, you are going to be emotional and nervous before you go to the ring, it doesn’t matter if it’s a big class or not,” said Pezzim. “You still get excited about going there. Everybody’s there watching. And you want everything to go well.”
To keep things on an even keel, Pezzim tried not to change things up too much. “I tried to keep everything the same,” she said. “Even though it’s a big class and it’s important. But they feel the atmosphere and he, 100 percent, felt it.”
Earlier during WEF week 1 – the Winter Equestrian Festival held at Wellington International – Nayel and “Ali” had a rail down. For Pezzim, it was no surprise that this had an impact on Ali’s mood.
“Normally he doesn’t have rails,” she said. “And he just understands what’s going on. And it is weird the feeling he gives you when he has a rail down. He feels bad. He tries to avoid looking at you to stop thinking about it. It has to be an intelligent, sensitive horse to feel that. He is really smart.”
When Pezzim arrived at Evergate Stables in New York, Ali was already there but fairly new to the barn. Since the other grooms already had horses designated to their care, Ali was available. Pezzim remembers. “He was very special. He was always very quiet in the stable, but you could tell that he’s very sharp.”
From there on their friendship grew into an exceptional understanding that sees her leave him loose in his stall when she goes in to carry out daily tasks. “When I groom him – when I go in the stable to do something with him – I don’t like to tie him up. Because for me, it’s the same when you bring somebody into your house. You have to trust them, right? I’m in his house. Why should I tie him up?”
It is a level of trust that Pezzim recognizes does not happen with every horse. She also looked after another Evergate’s star horse Monaco. As with Ali, Monaco was also able to bond deeply with her.
“That’s something that you have to create with them,” she said. “Those kinds of horses when they look at you, they look you in the eye. Few horses do that. They follow you everywhere, and they look you in the eye like a dog does.”
Featured photo courtesy of Evergate Stables.
Sarah Eakin has a long history of sports reporting and covering equestrian disciplines – particularly show jumping, polo, racing and dressage – for a range of international publications as writer and editor-in-chief. In 2024, Sarah launched Paper Horse – an online magazine with an eclectic mix of stories from the horse world at www.paperhorsemedia.com. Paper Horse is an official Media Partner of Wellington International. Sarah was born in England and came to the US in 1996 as Sidelines’ Polo Editor; at the time she was chief polo writer at the Horse and Hound and Polo Correspondent to The Daily Telegraph. She married US professional polo player Gary Eakin and stayed Stateside traveling throughout North America while covering equestrian events. She is also an author; Wed, White and Blue, her first novel is on Amazon.
