CH Extremely Fortunut is going for her sixth Devon three-gaited country pleasure championship with rider Molly Codeanne.
(Doug Shiflet)

The Devon Horse Show and Country Fair in Pennsylvania has been very good to the aptly named American Saddlebred mare CH Extremely Fortunut, who competes in the three-gaited country pleasure division at this show. Devon, a United States Equestrian Federation Heritage Competition that runs through June 4, also features top-class hunter, jumper, and driving competition.

“We bought her for a client when she was three, and her four-year-old year was the first time we brought her to Devon,” said trainer Kristen Cater, who co-owns Cater Stables in Dunbarton, N.H., with her husband, trainer David Cater. That first trip was a winning one: CH Extremely Fortunut won the junior exhibitor class that allowed her to qualify for the open championship, and then she won the championship, too. That was back in 2012. Since then, CH Extremely Fortunut has racked up championship wins every time she’s shown at Devon, twice with Brittany Cloutier and, since 2014, with current owner Ashlee Wheaton, who picked up her third Devon country pleasure championship with the mare last year. Along the way, CH Extremely Fortunut also won World’s Championship titles with both Cloutier and Wheaton.

The nine-year-old mare by Undulata’s Nutcracker will try to keep her Devon win streak alive this week in the Three-Gaited Country Pleasure Horse Junior Exhibitor class on June 2, followed by the $500 Three-Gaited Country Pleasure Horse Championship on June 3 in Devon’s historic Dixon Oval. Her rider this year is 17-year-old Molly Codeanne, who is leasing CH Extremely Fortunut from owner Wheaton, now a student at St. Francis Xavier University in Canada.

“Devon is her favorite place to show,” Cater said of the mare, whose nickname is Chalupa. “The crowd there is always awesome. In general, all of our horses like showing there, because it’s outside and there’s a lot of atmosphere, and I think the horses enjoy that, too.”

The country pleasure classes show off the American Saddlebred’s beauty, natural ability, and easygoing nature, and Cater says that CH Extremely Fortunut has what it takes to shine in the division. “They have to be naturally athletic, and they have to have good manners,” Cater explained, “and it helps that she’s very, very pretty! She has a lot of charisma, and she’s sort of the epitome of her division. There are a handful of great country pleasure horses, and there are two or three of those in the industry right now. I’d say she’s one of them. She’s proud of herself, and she’s very consistent. She always goes in and does her job. She has a long neck and is high-headed, and she has the ‘it factor’ that makes a horse special. She knows she’s special.”

Chalupa’s show-ring charisma comes with a good nature that Cater says is typical of her breed.

“In general, I think Saddlebreds are just the most versatile breed,” she explained. “She’s a good example of a horse that has a lot of excitement about her but that also has the manners to be able to go in and perform in a division in which manners are paramount. To be able to have fire and consistency isn’t something that I think every breed can do, but she’s an example of one who can do that."

“She’s one of my two favorite mares in the barn,” Cater added. “She’s one of those horses that if she’s happy, you know it, and if she’s mad, you know it. The happier she is, the better she performs. It’s sort of turned into a joke around here, but she gets nine peppermints waiting on the tail board in her stall when she’s done working, and she knows right where to go when she’s done to get her peppermints. She’s just got a lot of personality.”

Watch the action live from Devon—including hunter, jumper, saddle seat, and driving competition as well as special exhibitions—at USEF Network through the show’s conclusion on June 4. To learn more about the American Saddlebred and its history, visit US Equestrian’s American Saddlebred page and the American Saddlebred Horse Association.

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