Crossed Paths

by Erin Gilmore | Sidelines Magazine, March 2009

It’s never a good sign when a seller chooses to remark that their horse has never been cantered under saddle - while they watch a potential buyer do just that.

As Colin McIntosh dutifully cantered around on the horse which ten minutes prior he had had no intention of buying, he looked across the ring to where his wife Toni was watching and gave her a knowing look. Although the couple had agreed to try the gangly four-year-old chestnut gelding named Kronie only as a favor, they both knew that there was something about him worth getting to know.

It was 1991, and in addition to running an active 20 horse show barn on the northern coast of New Zealand, the husband/wife team was involved with the governing bodies of NZ horse sport to regulate and refine national coaching standards. Their free time was already scarce, and they had come to the small stable an hour away from their barn only to look at a trailer for sale. But the along with the trailer was a horse for sale; as often happens, the seller had gotten in over her head and purchased a young gelding that she could neither ride nor lead home after he was caught from his favorite habit of jumping out of his paddock and galloping down a railway that ran next to the stables. Obedience was not one of his selling points, but there was no doubt he could jump.

With plenty of other horses to keep them occupied, Toni and Colin had no intention of filling their new trailer with a naughty young horse. Nonetheless, “There certainly was something about him, even that day,” remembers Toni. Kronie had found a home.

At his new stable Kronie showed his intelligence by opening every closed and locked gate he could find, including his stall door. Toni found herself forced to put a padlock on his stall, because the danger of him running loose and having an accident out ruled with its frequency the danger of the horse being trapped in his stall in an emergency.  

In training, Kronie’s antics were naughty at worst to Toni and Colin, but included some funny quirks. “He would take a small jump straight into the air right in front of the fence, land and then jump it,” says Toni. “It was the weirdest thing.” 

While they progressed his jumping, Colin and Toni used extensive work on the flat to keep Kronie’s mind engaged. They found that he enjoyed his flatwork almost as much as jumping, but as Kronie evolved into an educated horse, he continued to buck and play before and after the fences. His careful jump left the fences up more often than not, but a turning point came in one of his first 1.10 classes. Kronie was bucking and playing around the course and knocked over a fence. “After that, he changed,” says Colin. “It was like a switch turned in him. He started jumping more technically, with talent.” It became clear that the 1.10s were child’s play, and once allowed to jump, the horse’s talents had
boundless potential.

Kronie improved quickly, and when he was eight, Colin entered him in his first Grand Prix. Together, they began winning, and turning heads at the national level. After winning a couple of World Cup qualifiers, Colin realized he had a horse on his hands that could be competitive internationally.  However, adding the demands of an international campaign to their full plate was unrealistic, and in early 1993 the decision was made to sell their young star.

Through a colleague in the United States, Kronie was imported to Northern California to begin a new life. Over the next decade Toni and Colin continued to grow their training business in New Zealand, with an eye towards one day relocating to the US themselves.

Although when, in 2004, Toni and Colin did move to the San Francisco Bay Area in Northern California to open a stateside version of McIntosh Stables, they had no expectations of seeing Kronie again. It had been over ten years and Kronie had since changed hands more than once. But as Toni admits, very special horses seem to find their way back to the right people.

While settling in to life in the United States, the couple had connected with the same colleague they had sold Kronie to in ‘93. Busy with helping to run a riding school and remodel their colleague’s barn, they had little time to wonder about a horse they’d sold so many
years earlier.

 Little time, that is, until Toni was approached by a student about a horse that was part of the collegiate riding program at nearby Stanford University. He was 17 years old and a former Grand Prix horse. The student, Megan Robinson-Gage, had friends on the equestrian team who were looking for a place to retire their horse from the demanding life of a collegiate team horse to a semi retirement in a riding school program. All of this didn’t strike a particular chord with Toni until the student mentioned the horse’s name; “Kronie.” At that word, Toni’s head snapped up and she got very quiet.

“Did you say ‘Kronie??’” she asked Megan. “We used to have a horse like that.”

Toni knew there was little chance that another tall chestnut ex-Grand Prix horse of that age, and with a name like Kronie would be in the area. She wasted no time telling Colin that their old horse might not only be alive and well, but living ten minutes away. After a quick phone call to the team by Megan, the three of them drove over to Stanford’s on-campus stables.

When the trio walked into the Stanford barn, there was indeed a tall chestnut horse cross tied in the aisle, facing away from them. Toni swears she knew that second, just from his hindquarters, that this was her old horse. As tears started to fill her eyes, she gasped and exclaimed to Megan that it was him, it was actually Kronie. In the meantime, Colin stepped quietly around the horse and stopped at his head, placing his hand under Kronie’s muzzle.

 “At that point, the horse took one sniff and nickered at him, and just melted,” remembers Megan. “It was clear that Kronie remembered them both. Everyone who was there watching was just bawling. Colin’s not a big emotional guy, but you could see the effect it had
on him.”

“There’s no chance that you can sell a horse across countries and oceans and think you’d ever see him again,” says Toni. “But we did find each other, and he knew us.”
There was no question that Toni and Colin would take Kronie and find a place for him in the riding school. Having their old horse back with them was a delight, and at 17, Kronie had retained his personality, if not his silly antics. All the same, Toni made sure that only the more experienced students rode him, as his large size and big gaits magnified to intimidating in the small school arena. His education on the flat, originally schooled into him by Colin so many years before, made him a valuable dressage lesson horse.  

As Kronie reached his 20s, Toni and Colin knew it was time to send him into official retirement. But this time, they kept track of their horse as he changed hands. Through a  connection from local dressage trainer Karen Pardini, Kronie found a home with Mary Shapiro on January 6, 2006. “I will have him forever. I have never sold any of my horses or dogs,” says Mary. “I always had gaited horses, and when I heard about him I thought it would be fun to ride a walk, trot, canter horse.”

At age 26, Kronie still makes his home at Mary’s barn, which is surrounded by acres of pasture on her property and allows the horses to wander in and out of the barn at their leisure. “He still loves to jump,” adds Mary, who rides Kronie for pleasure from time to time. “Just low jumps now, but his ears really prick up when he sees them.”