Tribute to a Veteran Texas Ride Host
ACTHA Monthly | 8
Like many young girls, Val grew up dreaming of horses. She watched all the TV shows with horses like My Friend Flika, Fury, The Lone Ranger and others. From a young age Val knew she loved horses, but with parents who were both school teachers, there was no room in their family budget for a horse. So she begged friends and neighbors for horse time, but these times were few and far between.
Fast forward a number of years and Val is now working as a sales manager for a dental company and living in the Kansas City area. It is time to start looking for land and a place to build a house; a barn and most importantly, own horses. During Val’s search, she met and married her husband who also had a love for horses. Over the 18 years they were married they began a breeding and training operation for Tennessee Walking Horses and other gaited breeds. Job relocation for Val brought them to Texas where they expanded her husband’s breeding and training operation. While continuing with her sales job, Val worked part time with her husband as they offered clinics on colt starting, natural horsemanship, and topics related specifically to gaited horses.
During this time Val and her husband were doing a lot of trail riding all over the country and a limited amount of showing. There were very few flat shod, sound gaited horse shows in Texas so Val decided to start one in the NE Texas area. She successfully produced and managed the Gaited Gala shows for 14 years.
By Jen Wenzel
Photography by Mark Limsky
For Heidi, the key to hosting a good ride starts with a Ride Host who has experienced an AOC or CTC themselves. Being a competitor
Continued >
During this time
she became heavily
involved with the sound
horse movement within the
Tennessee Walking Horse world.
Val served on the Board of Directors
for the Tennessee Walking Horse Breeder’s and Exhibitors Association and, after becoming disillusioned with the direction of that organization, sat on the Board of Directors for the National Walking Horse Association.
While on the Board of Directors for the NWHA, she co-managed the largest flat shod Tennessee Walking Horse show in the world at the NWHA National.
Val Delana with her TWH gelding, Mystery