13-Year-Old Isabella Himes Rides Assets Miss Reba to Win L2 Trail at Her First AQHYA World

By: Brittany Bevis

13-year-old Isabella Himes was surprised and elated to discover she was the L2 Champion in Youth Trail here at the 2017 AQHA Youth World Show late last night. This is Isabella’s first time competing at the Youth World Show and only her second year showing her 20-year-old mare, Assets Miss Reba.

Understandably, Isabella was very nervous to be competing at her first Youth World, but she was able to calm her nerves with the help of her new horse trainers, Chris and Melissa Jones. “I get really nervous,” she says. “So, Chris called me, because he’s currently at home, and he talked to me about the pattern and told me what I needed to do to stay calm.”

“We were working on my trot serpentines to get the lead foot, and sometimes we get antsy at the gate and the back, so we worked on that and it helped. I liked my gate a lot, as well as my lopes, and we got all of our lead feet on our serpentines!”

While Isabella enjoys showing in Trail, she’s most excited to be competing in L2 Horsemanship later this week, as well as L2 Equitation. “My favorite class is Horsemanship, because that’s the class we’ve succeeded the most in as a team. We do it together the best, and I enjoy doing it with her.”

Looking towards the future, Isabella has some big goals for her equestrian career. “Later on in my youth years, my goal is to win Horsemanship at the World Show, because that’s my favorite class. Also, my goal is to get into Texas A&M or Georgia to ride on an equestrian team.”

Before Isabella heads home to Indiana with her golden globe in tow, there is one thing she’d like to do to celebrate. “We went to this restaurant [Trapper’s] and I got oysters. I love oysters! Also, Reba will get lots of Oreos as her treat to celebrate.

Stay tuned for L3 Trail finals that will take place on Wednesday here in Oklahoma City.

L2 Trail results:

1- Assets Miss Reba/Isabella Himes
2- Virtually Perfect/Mackenzie Matthews
3- So Blazin I’m Amazin/Madison Parduhn
4- Grey Asset/Erin Griffin
5- Poison Rain/Brynn Campbell
6- Natural Order/Savannah Hauer
7- No Doubt I’m Somethin/Haley Riddle
8- Zippo Cash Award/Callie Adams
9- Lets Talk About AOK/Shea Graham
10- Sure A Hot Krymsun/Lydia Brahler