Two years ago, Liz Halliday suffered a traumatic brain injury when Shanroe Cooley fell on the cross-country course during the American Eventing Championships at the Kentucky Horse Park.
On Friday night, she was back in Lexington, Ky., at the championships, congratulating Boyd Martin, who guided Shanroe Cooley to victory in the $60,000 Adequan® U.S. Eventing Association Advanced Final.
“To ride him here in Liz’s hometown in front of Liz was very, very rewarding for me,” Boyd said, “because Liz put her heart and soul into this horse, and nothing made me happier than seeing her patting and smiling and hugging her champion horse.”
Liz, whose life-changing fall happened a month after she rode another horse in the 2024 Paris Olympics, is riding again, but in a different discipline. She is eligible to compete in Para Dressage at Grade II.
Liz had worked hard at developing Shanroe Cooley, who is known around the barn as Dallas. He was not injured when he fell at the 2024 AECs. But after the accident, Liz had to put all her effort into her rehabilitation, and Boyd took over the ride.
Dallas put in a clear round over the fences during the advanced section’s show jumping finale to take the title.
“He’s brilliant,” Boyd said of the 11-year-old Irish Sport Horse gelding (Dallas X Shanroe Sapphire).
“He’s a fantastic jumping horse. For all the big shows that are really important, he seems to prance out there and jump like a stag. I felt like he jumped the course really well. We had a good warm up, and I’m very pleased with him tonight.”
Only two of 18 starters were penalty-free over Bobby Murphy’s course in the Rolex Stadium — Bess Davis and Imperio Magic, the reserve champions, and Elisa Wallace with Lissavorra Quality, fourteenth. Although Dallas added 0.4 time penalties, he still had a margin sufficient for victory.
Boyd and Dallas were third at the Luhmühlen, Germany 5-star in June. At the AECs, they were third in dressage but gained the lead with their fast cross-country trip.
“I think he’s evolved and matured and developed a lot since Luhmühlen, and I think that was a great turning point in our career, just because it’s one of the toughest events in the world, and he finished strong there,” said Boyd, who returned earlier this month from competing on the bronze medal U.S. eventing team at the world championships in Aachen, Germany.
“Sometimes, when you do those big five-stars, it can rattle a horse,” Boyd observed.
In the case of Dallas, however, “it’s made him stronger and more seasoned. So I must say, all three phases this weekend with Dallas, he just felt like a more established, mature horse.”
Summing up the AECs, Boyd compared to being “like the Olympic Games for a lot of the younger riders and the amateur riders. The sport of eventing is thriving in this country,” he said.
“When you walk through the barns here and see the passion in all the people that are obsessed with this sport, it’s really, really exciting. I love coming here just because there’s a lot of faces that remind me of when I was 15 years old, dreaming of what could be in this sport, and I love coming down here just because obviously, Kentucky’s the mecca of all horse sports, and it’s great being around people that share the same passion as you.”
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