Team #653 Patty Johnson and Dancastle Timeline
Team #653: Patty Johnson and Dancastle Timeline
From: Woodstock, Illinois
Ages: 72 & 28
Combined Age: 100
Test: Introductory Level Test A
Date: June 4, 2023
Timer (Dancastle Timeline) and I have been a team for 15 years. At that time, I found myself without a horse (my 34-year-old Appaloosa mare, Queenie, had just passed away), and Timer’s mom had just succumbed to a second bout of lung cancer. June Pedersen, owner/trainer/matchmaker, at Castle Ridge Keep in Crystal Lake, Illinois, saw a possibility there that has been one of my life’s most beautiful partnerships. After a rocky start, I fell off this rather spirited horse in our first mount-up, we have learned how to work together, accepting each other’s quirks! Timer likes to be in the show ring, so we entered many schooling shows, working our way up from Intro to Training Level classes.
One of our highlights was in June of 2019 when we did a musical freestyle to a medley of Beatles songs at Fox Valley Saddle Association. Another highlight was competing at the Morgan Grand National in Oklahoma in October 2019. Timer not only got a big ribbon for being the “most senior” horse there, at the age of 24, out of over 900 other horses, but we won the Adult Amateur Intro Level division.
In the spring of 2021, Timer started to show some signs that he was in pain and was diagnosed with high ringbone. The decision had to be made to either have Timer become a “paddock pal” or to have surgery on his foot. Timer and I discussed it, and we quickly agreed on surgery. The surgery was wonderfully successful, and Timer turned out to be a rock star of a patient, now complete with a plate and screws in his hoof.
We took a break from competing from October 2019 until the Century Club ride came around. On that day, I couldn’t have been prouder of Timer. He entered the ring like he’d never left, and told me “I got you, mom!” It was one of our best rides ever, in that I didn’t have to either push or pull him - he had totally remembered the Intro A test and did it with ease! Our results reflected that, and we got one of our best scores ever!
Thank you to The Dressage Foundation and the Century Club for creating this opportunity. And thanks to June Pedersen for her coaching, patience, and extraordinary match-making skills.
