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Athlete Spotlight: Jenna Gibson
Equestrian Has Ridden in Over 50 Competitions
By Wayne Ireland
Staff Writer
Horses are majestic, friendly, and strong.
They can form a concrete bond with their human counterpart, the rider. A connection like this between horse and rider is an unbreakable one. They both must be able to bond in order to work with fluidity. It is also imperative that the rider takes care of the horse, which requires an immense amount of work to keep them in the best shape possible.
SophomoreJenna Gibson works well with these massive creatures as she is an equestrian. Jenna has been horseback riding since she was five, and currently rides twice a week. With all of this experience under her belt, Jenna knows everything there is to take care of a horse and how to ride one.
Jenna is the only one in her family who is an equestrian. She doesn’t remember how she became interested in horseback riding because she was so young at the time she started, but she does know that she greatly enjoys it.
On weekends, Jenna spends around eight hours with the horses at Plainbrooke Farm in Chester County. With all of the time she has spent with horses, she has no fear being around them; in fact, the only vibe she gets from horseback riding is positive and one that is filled with confidence.
Jenna has taken part in over 50 equestrian competitions. She said she has earned first place roughly 15 times. To prepare for all of these events, she had to face multiple hardships, including getting bucked off a horse.
Jenna has been thrown off twice. One time, “I was on a horse I have never ridden before, and it would attempt to buck me off and when the horse did, I fell off the front of the animal and broke my arm.”
Despite these hardships, Jenna says that the feeling she gets when horseback riding is incomparable to anything else. In fact, in Jenna’s eyes, horseback riding is the best activity of all.
When asked about Jenna’s riding skills, School Counselor Ms. Szmajda, who is the faculty advisor for the school’s Horseback Riding Club,said, “Jenna is an awesome rider and I am so happy that she joined horseback riding. She rides outside of school, so her skill is higher than some of the other participants here at Woodlynde.”
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Woodlynde School is a private, co-ed college prep day school located in suburban Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, that serves intelligent, talented students with learning differences in grades K - 12. Woodlynde provides a comprehensive, evidence-based Kindergarten, elementary, middle and high school program in a challenging yet nurturing environment for students with average to above average cognitive abilities (IQ) who have language- or math-based learning differences (such as Dyslexia, Dysgraphia or Dyscalculia), Executive Function Challenges, Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD), or Auditory Processing Disorder. Even for those students without a diagnosed learning disability (LD), Woodlynde offers expert and caring teachers in small classroom settings that support academic success. Woodlynde School also offers a post-graduate (PG) program in partnership with Rosemont College as well as a regional Summer Camp for students who learn differently.
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