However, Morgan Ekstrom, a Frewsburg Central School graduate and incoming freshman at Murray State University, is not like most students. Unlike the thousands of college freshmen moving away this month, Ekstrom will be bringing roughly an extra 2,000 pounds with her.

That extra weight?

Well that’s her horse, Cooper, who she spends most of her time with, training for quarter-horse shows. Ekstrom is one of the top quarter-horse show competitors in the nation and she is bringing her talents to the Murray State University Hunt Team competing in the Intercollegiate Horse Shows Association.

“I’ve always wanted to go south,” Morgan said about her college commitment. “We had friends that went to this college. We went and visited, talked to the coaches there and they said they would really like for me to be on the team.”

Ekstrom performs at a quarter-horse show with Cooper.

For the past few years, when competing, Morgan has rode her current horse Cooper, but at collegiate competitions she will randomly be drawn a horse to show. Getting quickly acclimated to a horse will be difficult, but that’s just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to what goes into showing horses.

“I sign up for different classes I can go in,” Morgan said about competing. “Some are patterns, some are on the rail. For Western, I do one class based on my horse and one based on me. They’ll look at my position and how I’m communicating with my horse. It’s a lot of if me and my horse are getting along. The rail class is based on my horse and looks at his movement and can kind of (be) based on how he is bred, too.”

All of those judgments are difficult, with each detail being scrutinized.

“The patterns are really specific, like if I do everything in the right point in the pattern,” Morgan added. “There’s a whole list of what you have to do in the pattern and if I go off that a little bit, I can get a bad score. For one weekend show I have to memorize 12 patterns. For a Western, I might have to start at one cone, back up, do a 360-degree turn, trot off and there’s extended trot, lope, change the leads, stomping back and forth at the end of the pattern.”

If there is anyone concerned if she’s up to the task, they need look no further than her list of accomplishments up to this point and her long path to this success.

Morgan Ekstrom poses for a photo with her horse, Cooper.

ı ı ı

Ekstrom’s journey began at just 5 years old when her horse riding career started with Western Pleasure showing, but soon transitioned into barrel racing which her older sister, Olivia, still continues to do.

“She’s competed at the Ellicottville Rodeo, Darwood where she won a buckle and a coat,” Morgan and Olivia’s father, Todd, said about Olivia and barrel racing. “It’s two totally different things, Morgan is a little more into showing, but Olivia is in her third year of college and is going to be an architect. She still goes with her horse and takes care of her on her own.”

Morgan began on a little pony named Redrock, doing it just for fun for a couple of years before progressing to her next horse, Puzzle. The Ekstrom’s leased Puzzle for Morgan, but purchased Stone, a step-up horse, for Olivia.

While Puzzle was Morgan’s next horse, it would be Stone who set her on her current path, away from barrel racing. Stone became afflicted with arthritis and couldn’t race anymore which opened another door — showing.

Olivia Ekstrom participates in barrel racing on her horse, Shayde.

“His arthritis got really bad,” Morgan said about Stone. “He couldn’t do the barrel racing anymore and people always said that he would be a good show horse. He kind of inspired me to do that and he did really well with it.”

“That’s really when she started showing,” Dawn, Morgan’s mother, added. “She couldn’t barrel race on him anymore and still wanted to work with him.”

Morgan worked with Stone for as long as she could, but as his arthritis continued to worsen and her skills began to flourish it was time for another step-up horse. In 2020, Morgan began working with her current horse, Cooper, and then the accolades began to come in, but not before some hard work getting comfortable with each other.

“When I first started riding him, Audrey Ferrie, who owned him, just let me when Stone was sick,” Ekstrom said about her early experiences with Cooper. “We got along really good then and then we eventually bought him. When we first got him to our barn we didn’t get along. It was very difficult for a while, but he was just trying to test me. It took that whole winter for him to come around for me to finally be able to show him.”

ı ı ı

It wasn’t long after Morgan began riding with Cooper that the family made the decision to purchase him and, despite the hefty price tag, he has been well worth it with all the success the pair have had.

Just days after Stone passed on Sept. 20, 2021, Morgan and Cooper placed top five and 10 in Pennsylvania at 4H States with Cooper. Then, that winter, Morgan joined her trainer, Heather Payne of IEA Team and she showed all winter to qualify for nationals.

At nationals, Morgan was the Reserve National Champion in Ranch Riding and earned a scholarship. Then, in April of 2022 at her first higher level quarter-horse show, she was named the grand champion under four of the five judges to become the overall weekend high point, all in the first time showing Cooper in Western style. Next was the All American Youth Horse Show in which she took eighth place out of 40 riders; in the Candy Apple Classic she won the Grand Champion Rookie in the Youth Division; then in the fall show, competing in youth all-around, she was the Circuit Champion Youth Equitation and Reserve Champion Level One Youth Equitation.

But the biggest event was last year when her dad surprised her by bringing her to compete in the American Quarter Horse Association Congress, which is the largest single-breed horse show in the world. At that event there were more than 100 riders in each of her classes and she took 30th in one of them.

“It’s kind of unusual to be an all-around, not all horses can do all-around,” Dawn Ekstrom stated. “She’s trained him to do both. Most horses will do English or Western, but they won’t do both. For her to get fourth in the nation with the American Quarter Horse Association with only going to three shows is huge. A lot of the other people that get these placings go to a lot more shows, but we can’t afford to, nor do we have the time to with work, so for her to go three shows and get that is huge.”

But with how much time and how well Morgan takes care of Cooper it is no surprise how successful they have become. The maintenance and care needed is unlike any other sport.

“When I’m at a show I have to give him a bath pretty much every day,” Morgan said about maintaining Cooper. “I have special spa treatments, I have a spray bottle for him if he gets spots in the mud. I clip his ears, his muzzle, his legs and make sure he’s shedded out all his winter hair. I paint his hooves black, I put baby oil on his face to make it shine and then we put an artificial tail in to make it look full. I band his mane for Western and then braid his hair for English.”

These tasks are just something that Morgan does on her own; her parents never have to remind her. In fact, sometimes she spends too much time taking care of Cooper, who is just as much a member of the family.

“Never had to push that with her to go take care of your horse or go do chores,” Morgan’s parents said about maintaining her horses. “If anything, we’re saying ‘Could you stay home and do something?’ or ‘Are you ever coming home tonight for dinner?’ That’s usually what it is. She would much rather be in the barn.”

The reason Morgan spends so much time with Cooper is because it is a sport that never stops, and when not at a training stable you have to make sure you take care of your horse.

“I clean stalls every other day at the barn,” Morgan stated. “If I’m cleaning one whole barn, I clean a bunch of the stalls and isleways. I have to do something with my horse in that time because he doesn’t want to stand in the stall since he’s bored, so I put him out to pasture. Then I go and clean the other barn stalls, then I go get him from the pasture if I want to ride that day. I give him water or hay if he needs it, then I lunge him to get his energy out. … I make sure he has all of his supplements for that night, then I blanket him for each different season.”

ı ı ı

On top of all the practice, maintenance and skills required in horse shows, Morgan overcomes something other riders do not.

Morgan has Symbrachydactyly, which is a congenital condition (present at birth) hand anomaly, which affects a single upper limb. It is characterized by short, stiff, webbed or missing fingers. The underlying muscles, tendons, ligaments and bones are all affected.

“I was born with my hand like this,” Morgan explained. “I’ve had trainers (Jillian Schults) help me hold the reins because that was hard to adapt to. If the horse threw its head, the reins would come out of my hands so I had to learn how to adjust to that with my hand and how to ride. Now it’s just easy for me.”

This is a big deal in horse riding, specifically when showing horses, because not only do the horses have to look their best, riders abide by a dress code.

“She has to wear gloves,” Todd added about the uniforms. “The gloves are adjusted because she has to wear them. When you’re showing it is a requirement.”

There is a classification for individuals with physical disadvantages, but Morgan has not been held back by hers. Instead, she continues to flourish.

“For somebody with only one hand to do this,” Dawn added. “Nobody ever knows, she never says at a show, it’s never known that she has one hand. There is divisions for equestrians with disabilities, but she’s never done that. She has just gone in there and done her thing.”

ı ı ı

In just a week Morgan will be moving into her apartment to attend Murray State University, and while she will be competing for the school with drawn horses, Cooper is coming with. When not competing with the school’s Hunt Seat team, she will still get to as many individual events as she can.

With her work ethic and the strong support from many family and friends, there is no doubt that Morgan will be adding to the hundreds of ribbons, and stocking the trophy case with more awards.