I remember my friend Bo Derek saying that some girls are simply born with the gene of loving horses and I seem to be one of them. I grew up in India and started my riding life with the ugliest pony mankind had ever seen. I was quite fearless in the early days and would often take my brother for spins on the back of my demon pony, secretly enjoying every moment of his discomfort. All went according to plan until he discovered cars. He would drive up behind me in his military edition Jeep, honk the horn and do a dust filled ‘wheelie’ in reverse screaming “bet you can’t do this!” Thanks to the ensuing commotion and my pony’s hysteria, I learned early on, to sit a full gallop.

Horses have always been a great part of my father’s side of the family, particularly for my grandmother and great aunt. My grandmother was a very accomplished polo player and my great aunt excelled at jumping and trick riding. I don’t remember seeing either of them ever ride without being immaculately dressed with their horses equally well turned out. In those days, most of the riding horses in India were imported from Europe and only a certain section of the cavalry would ride Indian-bred horses.

Both women proved such an inspiration to me; perhaps it was natural for me to inherit their love of horses. My first ‘serious’ horse was an Indian breed, the Marwari – recognized typically for their arched ears, which meet at the top of their tips and act like mini radars. They are great for endurance riding and have a very particular fifth gait. Something like a fast and powerful trot, where their hind quarters sink and they propel up and forward like a speed boat taking off. I don’t remember the name of my horse, but I certainly remember the white-knuckle rides I had on him as a child when he would either take off or throw me off. My father would sometimes lead him in through the front door of our house and out to the terrace during dinner parties just to irritate my mother and it always had the desired effect, which amused him so much.

As I got older, my father and I would have competitions of ‘tent pegging’ which is a British cavalry exercise of galloping full speed holding a lance in the right hand to stab square pieces of paper from the ground or collecting rubber circles balanced on a pole at shoulder height. I never had so much fun loosing!

I continued to ride throughout my teenage years and school days in Switzerland, with lessons on Warmbloods with strict teachers making us do exercises like riding with sticks propped behind our elbows to learn good posture or holding pennies between our knees and the saddle, with serious punishment if we let them drop. All of them, very old fashioned disciplines compared to today’s standards and teaching methods. I didn’t enjoy those years, but felt I should learn to be more disciplined in my riding and not just gallop around with the wind in my hair having fun.

In the 70’s, our family bought a ranch in California and I was introduced to the Quarter Horse and the cowboy life. I loved every minute of it, from the tough cattle drives, to simple trail rides and later, picking up a rope and doing a vaguely decent job. I was full of enthusiasm and loved being outdoors. The Quarter Horse was a breath of fresh air after the effort of riding Warmbloods in closed arenas, yet equally talented in their field of work. I even came to love and enjoy mules who are notoriously difficult, but very rewarding to ride in tough terrain.

Somehow though, throughout those years, I had a vision of a fairytale horse I imagined and sometimes caught a glimpse of in movies, but had I no idea they actually existed as a breed till many years later.

That day came when I rode over to the ranch of my neighbors, actress Bo Derek and her husband, John. It was there that I found the beautiful horses I had dreamt of for so long. Fortune was smiling on me as Bo and her trainer Ramon Becerra, were about to work some of the horses and she asked if I would like to ride her favorite Lusitano stallion, Mouro. I was both nervous and excited. When I got on his back, I could not believe the contained power and movement of the horse. He was ready to go with the lightest hand. No huge effort pushing with the legs or excessive contact on the bit was needed. I was able to keep my hand light and the slightest shift of the seat and leg produced beautiful lead changes and a few instructions led to the most dramatic side passes and passage.

In her book The Royal Horse of Europe, Sylvia Loch writes, “Every person I have come across who has spent time with these horses, particularly on their backs, has felt the same awe and longing to learn more”. That day started me on a life long love of the breed, but I had much to learn about how to ride them. In the years to come, I spent many hours with Ramon, trotting and trotting and trotting till I hated it more than anything else. It did, however, teach me the seat that would be invaluable in riding correctly, from finished horses to the younger ones starting off in the classical disciplines.

Years of friendship with Bo and traveling extensively, riding together at horse farms in Spain, Portugal and France and visiting every Andalusian and Lusitano horse show in Europe, I knew that one day, I would own an Iberian horse. It was just a question of finding the right one. I did however, fall in love with dozens of them along the way, but importing them into the United States proved fairly complicated due to their propensity of equine piroplasmosis (known as equine babesiosis), which is a tick-borne protozoal disease. About 90% of the world horse population has been exposed to it, and almost the only countries that do not have it are the USA, Canada, Australia, England, Ireland, Japan and Iceland.

In 1998, a great friend and owner of Spanish Horses and Lusitanos in California, Diandra Douglas, gave me the gift of a 2 1/2 year old filly. Diandra had managed to import into the USA five mares and two stallions of the very highest quality from Portugal. This proved extremely difficult, not only because of the rigorous testing for piro and quarantine when they arrive in this country, but because breeders in Europe rarely part with the foundation breeding mares as they are often prized higher than stallions. My filly was bred from the prize-winning stallion (Gabaco) belonging to Filipe Giraldes de Figueroa (Graciosa), head of the Escola Portuguesa Riding School and out of a fabulous mare (Leziria) from the Portuguese breeder, Ortigoa Costa. My filly, Nubia, arrived in America as a yearling with her dam.

Typical of the Lusitano, my horse had the very dry Roman head of the Portuguese breed and was slight in body. The Iberian blooded breeds tend to mature far later than Warmbloods, Thoroughbreds, Arabs and the Quarter horses, which most U.S. horse owners are familiar with. Most racing Thoroughbreds have finished their careers by age four, but ours are only just starting theirs.

A few days after we brought Nubia home, our ranch manager, Luis Ramirez, noticed strange behavior in her - far more familiar with stallions. She would paw the ground, crest her neck and flehmen (curl her lips) which is an olfactory process used by stallions to determine if a mare is in heat. We hoped she may simply need mineral supplements as she seemed very healthy in every other way.

 Although Nubia was well mannered and halter broke when I got her, Luis took time for more ground work like picking up her feet regularly and getting her used to being tied and trailered for lengthy amounts of time; we were pleased at how easy going and quiet she was. After a few months, Luis introduced her to a saddle and started breaking her to ride. When I asked him what he remembers of that time, he recounted, “She was one of the easiest and most honest horses I’ve broken. Not a mean bone in her body… but that energy,” after which he threw his head back and laughed as if like he’d told the funniest joke in the world. It was just the shape of things to come!

During that time, Bo was moving and asked me to take care of her 25 year old Andalusian mare, so it seemed like a good idea to turn both mares out together as we had only geldings at our ranch. Within a week, Bo’s mare had come into heat having been dry for five years and I was more than surprised to see my mare mounting her on a regular basis. Bo asked if I’d considered renting out my horse to tease in the stallions at the many racing stables in our area, which was an amusing thought, but it was still troubling to see such odd behavior.

As the months passed, we could not ignore that something was very different about Nubia. I had been more familiar with geldings and stallions, but knew mares did not habitually behave as strangely as she did. I also noticed that in the whole time she was with me, she had never come into heat which was odd for a three year old, so I put in a call to my vet, Dr. Doug Herthel, founder of the prestigious, Alamo Pintado Equine Medical Center in the Santa Ynez Valley where I live. My question to him was not very delicately put. “Doug, is there such a thing as a lesbian mare?”

With his vast experience, Doug recommended I bring Nubia in for an ultrasound, as in rare cases, mares could sometimes form a tumor on their ovaries which forced them to produce too much testosterone and in turn, would prompt typical stallion behavior. We loaded Nubia up and took her to Dr Herthel’s beautiful and serene facility where he proceeded with an ultrasound to determine if his initial diagnosis was correct.

He explained what he was seeing and feeling as I watched on the monitor. His arm was in up to his shoulder and the ultrasound showed a gigantic growth on her left ovary, far bigger than the ultrasound could image completely. He calmly explained that it was definitely a tumor, but he had no idea how large it was, or if it was malignant. I remember feeling shocked at the diagnosis, but Doug was kind enough to explain everything with great patience and let me know what my options were. Basically, I had two of them. I could either put her down as soon as possible, or operate to minimize the real chance of the tumor rupturing and killing her in the very near future. For me, there was no choice and we set a date for her operation.
Doug advised me that he would only know, once he had opened her up, if he could save her, because at that point we still had no idea how extensively the tumor had spread, or if it was malignant. We agreed that if there were any surprises once he operated, he would put her down while she was still on the table to avoid her suffering later.

Dr. Herthel suggested putting her on a course of Platinum Performance, which he had pioneered with great success. It’s a mineral supplement widely used on performance horses and has also been proven to greatly speed recovery after surgery. Most recently, the American Olympic swimming team took human versions of the supplement with great results. A month later, Dr. Herthel and his team at Alamo Pintado got to work on Nubia.

Because of the immense size of the ovarian tumor, special precautions before, during and after surgery had to be taken. Prior to surgery, a blood donor had to be made immediately available in case the large vessels supplying the ovarian tumor were to spontaneously rupture or leak during the removal of the large tumor. Getting to and ligating the very large arteries and veins supplying the tumor was very problematic and a special sterile stainless steel clamp very similar to a hose clamp allowed for an extremely strong and safe way to ligate the large vessels while the 37 pound granulosa cell tumor was isolated inside the abdomen and then carefully removed after complete arterial and veinous ligation was completed. It was critical that no blood from the ovarian tumor escaped and that there was absolutely no leakage from the large vessel ligations. This could potentially cause spread of the tumor cells to the peritoneal lining of the abdomen, which would be very dangerous for the mare and could give a very bad prognosis for her recovery for the short and long term. The tumor was so large that its circumference required a very long ventral midline incision to in order to remove it gently from the abdomen. The tumor was on the verge of a spontaneous rupture, which could have caused her to spontaneously bleed out or to spontaneously seed out tumor cells throughout the abdominal cavity. By preparing Nubia for the surgery on an elective basis, she was given a much better chance of survival than if she had come in for an emergency tumor removal.

The removal of the tumor took three hours, which weighed in at 37 pounds and was the second largest recorded in America. More surprising was that Nubia was so young at the time. Thankfully it proved benign. Doug also informed me that he had managed to save her remaining ovary, but she held little chance of ovulating as it was so shrunken due to the size of the enormous tumor of the opposite ovary. Whether or not she had a functioning ovary was the least of my concerns at that point, and I was just grateful that he had completed the surgery successfully.

Nubia remained at the clinic for a short time after her surgery, and after that, with Dr. Herthel’s team monitoring her progress. Thankfully, there were no complications. UC Davis received her ‘pickled’ tumor as a case study and Nubia came back to the ranch to recover. I have no doubt, the Platinum Performance supplements, before and after the surgery greatly speeded her recovery.

I remember sharing a laugh with my mother who asked if Dr. Herthel did cosmetic surgery on humans as she was so impressed by the beautiful and neat stitches, which Nubia had from stem to stern. At some point during Nubia’s convalescence, I remember asking Luis, what he thought she would be like when she recovered, and he kidded me that she may turn into a very hot horse.

Nubia had many months convalescing and being lazy after her surgery and made a full recovery with care at home under Doug’s expert supervision. By the time we decided to saddle and start riding her again, my sweet and calm mare, upon feeling much, much better at being rid of her cumbersome tumor, morphed into a missile.

Luis did a lot of work with Nubia at our ranch, up and down steep hills, long trail rides which introduced her to cattle, and the beach. I also started to ride her more, but her ‘brakes’ were slightly lacking. She never bolted, but she wasn’t on the bit and when I tried to rein her in, she would get over excited and put her head up and slide out from under me. She was so full of energy and if she was bored, she would engage in her own sort of ‘Aires Above The Ground’ with no training in that discipline. I counted my blessings that I didn’t eat dirt on a regular basis.

I decided to see what Ramon Becerra could advise, as he is well known as an extraordinary rider and trainer of the Iberian breeds in America. We had become firm friends from 20 years ago after that first day of meeting at Bo and John Derek’s ranch. After much laughter at my failed attempts to show her off beautifully, I decided to leave Nubia with him. Ramon re-started her in a snaffle so she would be more on the bit when she collected instead of pushing against it or completely off it. He also worked to get her head down and force her to collect herself correctly and strengthen her back. After a certain level of collection is achieved, the horses progress to the double bridle and later the curb bit or Spanish bit.

To learn the Spanish disciplines of classical dressage and aires above the ground, the Iberian breeds need to be round and collected, with their backs engaged and underneath themselves with their hindquarters. Thoroughbreds can work more on the forehand and Quarter Horses can do fantastically well, working off their hand quarters without the need of the same level of collection.

Mares in Spain and Portugal are not frequently broken to ride except for the rare exception, but I had decided early on, that I was not going to feed and doctor a horse for 30 years, if it was not going to work for me in some way. Before her tumor was discovered, I thought I would breed Nubia, but in the meantime, she had to earn her keep and I saw no good reason she could not be a decent riding horse. Perhaps I should have considered my own riding ability at the first signs of her volatile temperament!

While I prayed and did three thousand Hail Marys every time I rode her, Ramon eventually found a way to harness her energy and lightness into an act for his shows doing the garrocha, a very typical Spanish tradition of testing the cattle’s bravery in the open fields using an 12 foot long stick. It has now become an art form and resembles a ballet between horse and rider, but is rarely seen performed in the USA, let alone with a mare. Ramon’s innate sense of what each horse is talented at, led him to realize what Nubia enjoyed, and she was able to master the intricate work of complicated lead changes and roll backs, and her athleticism made the many quick changes of direction easy, yet challenged her mind in a way Spanish dressage did not. She was good with piaffe on the ground, but a ridden one or passage which she did moderately well, provoked the most terrible temper tantrums and it hardly seemed worth it to push her in that area as I was not planning to compete in the dressage world.

As Ramon explained it, Nubia’s fiery temperament was the challenge and not her physical ability. He harnessed her strength and balance into the garrocha, which cannot be done with a horse lacking in energy or impulsion, and their finished act was ultimately superb.

By the great skill of Dr. Herthel saving Nubia’s remaining ovary, she eventually came into heat and two years after her operation, I decided to breed her. Due to the surgery, I was advised to use a surrogate mare as Nubia had had so much internal tissue removed with the tumor, she may have had trouble carrying full term and I was not prepared to take the risk. A friend of mine, Steve Siegel, who owned a string of polo ponies, knew I was looking for a surrogate mare and kindly gave me a mare so I started the process of embryo transfer.

As a birthday present from Diandra who had given me Nubia, I had a breeding to her wonderful Lusitano stallion, Jardim. When the time came, poor Jardim was teased by the oldest mare in circulation, but produced fantastic sperm and the transfer went well the second attempt. The surrogate mare carried the foal with no complications and I impatiently waited out the 11 months. As the foal would not make its arrival for two weeks over the due date, I decided at the last minute, to go to the Kentucky Derby with Bo. As luck would have it, the filly, Veolisa, was born Derby Day: May 4, 2002.

Nubia has since stayed with Ramon when I am out of the country and was one of the principal horses for his acts for many years, performing everywhere from Las Vegas to the East Coast. She has even received fan mail addressed to the “Pole Dancing Horse,” which always makes us laugh. When I get back to America and our ranch, I take Nubia home and turn her out for extended vacations to let her head rest from work and performing, but this year, she has been my all-around horse. She has days off work, enjoying roaming the large corral and dozing under oak trees, but she makes the cut for tough cattle gatherings in the Figueroa mountains, corral brandings, fun days in the gigantic sand dunes of Pismo Beach or quiet trail rides around our ranch.

While slightly more mellow now that she’s into her middle age years, the slightest touch of your leg still produces the terrific energy, which makes her so good for both Ramon’s work and my time with her. I like to think she relaxes when she’s home, but perhaps the two of us are getting slightly too long in the tooth for multiple missile launches.