Jaimie Ser­rette-Fletch­er de­liv­ered an out­stand­ing per­for­mance to se­cure third place over­all in the Pre-In­fan­til A class, with a jump height of 1.0 me­tres, at the pres­ti­gious Con­cur­so In­vi­ta­tion­al Guatemala 2024, from Feb­ru­ary 5-19.

Rid­ing the love­ly warm­blood mare Mari­bel, the 13-year-old show­cased her skill and de­ter­mi­na­tion, stand­ing out as the on­ly over­seas rid­er in the top four po­si­tions. Her im­pres­sive feat in­clud­ed no­table fin­ish­es in var­i­ous class­es through­out the com­pe­ti­tion, in­clud­ing a sixth-place fin­ish in the Speed class and strong place­ments in the Im­me­di­ate Jump-Off events.

Ser­rette-Fletch­er was among four of T&T’s most promis­ing ju­nior rid­ers show­cas­ing their skills on an in­ter­na­tion­al stage at the pres­ti­gious event in Guatemala City. The event, which at­tract­ed 12 coun­tries and fea­tured some 299 rid­ers, proved to be a re­mark­able op­por­tu­ni­ty for the young eques­tri­ans to test their met­tle against a di­verse field of com­peti­tors.

Rep­re­sent­ing Team T&T along with Ser­rette-Fletch­er were her sis­ter Justynne, Caitlin Se­bastien, and Cait­lyn Whitling. The com­pe­ti­tion, known for its “bor­rowed horse” for­mat, re­quired rid­ers to adapt quick­ly to un­fa­mil­iar mounts, adding an ex­tra lay­er of chal­lenge to the al­ready in­tense com­pe­ti­tion.

Justynne al­so demon­strat­ed her prowess in the sad­dle, com­pet­ing in the Am­plia class with warm­blood Har­ryquote PB. Justynne’s best fin­ish came with a fifth-place re­sult in the Speed class, de­spite fac­ing stiff com­pe­ti­tion from 56 oth­er rid­ers ac­cord­ing to a re­lease from the T&T Eques­tri­an As­so­ci­a­tion (TTEA).

Mean­while, Se­bastien and Whitling, com­pet­ing at heights of .80 me­tres and .70 me­tres, re­spec­tive­ly, ex­hib­it­ed com­mend­able per­for­mances de­spite fac­ing chal­lenges with their as­signed hors­es. While both rid­ers en­coun­tered time faults in their Op­ti­mum Time class­es, they gained in­valu­able ex­pe­ri­ence from their in­au­gur­al over­seas com­pe­ti­tion.

The Trinida­di­an rid­ers were coached by Colom­bian coach Jorge Gal­lego of El Tam­bre Sta­bles in Bo­gotá dur­ing the Guatemala com­pe­ti­tion. Back home, Jaimie and Justynne, along with Se­bastien, re­ceive coach­ing from Patrice Stollmey­er at Sandy Hill Sta­bles in Freeport, while Whitling is coached by Na­tal­ie Rapi­er at San An­to­nio Sta­bles in San­ta Cruz.

The ef­forts of the quar­tet re­ceived high praise from the TTEA which stat­ed in the re­lease: “The par­tic­i­pa­tion of T&T’s ju­nior rid­ers in the Con­cur­so In­vi­ta­tion­al Guatemala 2024 un­der­scores the grow­ing tal­ent and ded­i­ca­tion with­in the coun­try’s eques­tri­an com­mu­ni­ty.

Their im­pres­sive per­for­mances serve as a tes­ta­ment to their hard work, skill, and the in­valu­able sup­port of their coach­es and sup­port­ers.”