Teen brings home medals with Sweet Caroline

SANDPOINT — Last week, Boston Bode and her recently trained mustang, Sweet Caroline, brought home multiple awards following a two-day trip to a meet designed to test the skills of newly trained wild mustangs.

The incentive program challenges trainers to participate in 100 days of training wild mustangs and then show the horses alongside each other. At the competition, held in Temecula, Calif., Bode and Sweet Caroline won first place for a trail class and freestyle competition, and second place overall. While Bode has participated in the challenge before, this was her first time competing in the adult division.

Trainers participate in three classes as part of the challenge: a training and conditioning class, a trail class and a freestyle class.

“The handling and conditioning class shows that the horse is tame and can be caught and pick up its feet, you can brush it and fly spray it and load it in a trailer,” Bode said.

The trail class offers trainers an opportunity to demonstrate how their horse would behave on a trail by walking through an obstacle course.

During the freestyle class, trainers are given three-and-a-half minutes to perform a choreographed routine to a song.

Bode said she credits her success to dedicating her time and going at the horse’s pace.

“Even if you start slower, they’ll have a breakthrough and everything picks up,” Bode said. “It’s better to go by their pace than push them too hard.”

In 2022, over 82,000 wild horses and burros were estimated to be on government land and in holding pens, organizers of the event said on their Facebook page.

“There is not enough land to feed and sustain this many animals,” they said. “So our hope is that with our show we can get horses and burros out of holding and into homes.”

Sweet Caroline is looking for a new home now that her training is complete. Bode said the mustang is up for adoption through the Bureau of Land Management with a training fee.