The Real Rider Cup, a charity show jumping event created by Anita Motion to benefit Thoroughbred aftercare, is bringing the racing and equestrian worlds together in Lexington, Kentucky just ahead of Fasig-Tipton’s July Sale.

I was a freshman in high school when I fell off of my first rearing horse. The image of the mare on her hind legs in front of me, with my butt in the sand is seared into my brain: deep in the recesses, but it’s there nonetheless. I don’t remember hurting after that fall. Maybe I did but all I remember is thinking, this girl is going to fall over on top of me. She didn’t, and I don’t even remember it instilling a fear in me those following years, but here we are, over ten years later, and suddenly I’m thinking about it all the time.