Because it was not so long ago that the 18 year-old Warwick (NY) High School senior and the nine year-old Spanish Mustang mare had both been fighting for their lives.
Today, Camille and Quest are the 2014 PHA Invitational Low (2'9”) Jumper Champions, and their victory gallop was matched only by mom and trainer Nina Lieberman's unabashed happy dance shared ringside with Bob Cacchione, on hand as executive director representing the Intercollegiate Horse Show Association (IHSA) as a PHA Invitational Gold level sponsor.
Nina, who captained the 1984-89 IHSA team at William Patterson College and runs a lessons and a therapeutic riding program at 45-stall Whisper Wind Farm, jokes that her daughter learned the rhythm and balance of equitation in utero: “I rode throughout my pregnancy.”
Camille and Quest's achievements, however, are entirely their own.
“She's in Pony Club, and this past season, between high school and PHA Finals, she and Quest participated in USPCA Games demonstrations at the Kentucky Horse Park, Central Park (NY) Horse Show and President's Cup at the Washington International Horse Show.
“I'm in such awe of her as a rider. I can say I've introduced her to dressage, hunter/jumpers and fox hunting, but know nothing about Pony Club Games. Those running vaults and exercises? That's all Camille.
“When she graduates, she wants to be a Marine. My daughter,” she laughs, “is a bad-ass!”
Camille's brave and bold demeanor hid more than a rider's usual soft spot for animals (Whisper Wind is populated by rescues of all kinds, from horses to dogs to barn cats). For much of her life, her immune system's natural fortitude had been suppressing an inheritable condition usually identified by infancy: Cystic fibrosis.
CF, or mucoviscidosis, is an inheritable disorder, mostly affecting the lungs and leading to difficulty breathing and frequent infections. At 17, Camille's CF had begun to aggressively reveal itself, progressively worsening her condition until the vibrant equestrienne weighed just 93 pounds and was coughing up blood. At first, doctors feared lymphoma; it was not until a nearly last-resort lung biopsy, urged specifically by Nina, that CF was identified.
“It was the last thing they expected to test for,” Nina says. “We were so fortunate to have New York-Presbyterian Hospital/Columbia University Medical Center nearby, whose Center for Acute Respiratory Failure is one of the foremost in the world for treating CF. They confirmed in 15 minutes what Camille's problem was.”
The bad news was CF. The good news was that it was manageable, and the strong immune system Camille had otherwise inherited had proved incredibly effective until now at keeping CF at bay in its young host, who was determined to keep riding.
“We have been so lucky to have a managing physician like Dr. Emily DiMango, who gave Camille the okay to ride in the Finals, and pulmonary/critical care expert as Dr. Selim Arcasoy, who initially diagnosed her. He was amazing. He asked how many horses she rode on a good day, and Camille told him two or three. So throughout her antibiotics treatments, he asked her to try and ride more, maybe three to five horses, and if he could share photos of her jumping Quest with his 10 year-old daughter, because they might give her courage when riding, too.”
Camille's recovery has been as inspiring as that of her Spanish Mustang.
Whisper Wind's 45 acres are no stranger to rescue horses and ponies that Camille retrains and sells, often to USPC families, before turning her profit around to rescue the next in need. While scrolling an online catalog of animals whose unfortunate fates had led them to the pens at Camelot, she found a Spanish Mustang mare and knew “she was it.”
The seven year-old tricolor pinto mare was neither the best-sized (cataloged at 13.2 hands, but closer to 14 hh), healthiest (she arrived sick with shipping fever), prettiest or best trained (her only demonstrated aptitude was for rearing over backwards).
That didn't stop Camille, who asked her mom, “Who else is going to fix her, if I don't?”
Nina says, “There's no question that Quest knows she is rescued. She's a team player. She learns in big chunks. She can be very smart and very stubborn, but so can Camille. Once Quest realized if she was good, they'd get to have fun, she said okay let's go. They've done hunter paces, fox hunting, trick or treating and camping!”
At the PHA Invitational, Camille and Quest also shared one more unforgettable achievement: Making the cut from 14 qualifiers in the PHA Invitational Low Jumper Championship to the top four in the jump-off. First to go, the teen and her Mustang also proved first to finish.
“Somehow she's always known this pony would be special,” her mom says. “She told me she named her Quest for Camelot after the notorious auction so that, 'When she's famous, people will know that you can get a great horse or pony as a rescue if you know what you're doing.'”
Nina is proudest of her daughter for championing kindness: “When Camille realized the PHA class had a purse she asked, if I win this, can we put it towards rescuing another horse?
“There's a fresh truckload of mustangs arriving in November. We'll be looking.” As for Quest? Nina assures she has a forever home. “Camille's goal was to give her a purpose and place in life. She'll be fine. She's a great baby sitter and confidence-builder for every rider she carries.”