Vaulting Ambitions : Horse Program Welcomes Children With Special Needs

A year ago, Anne-Marie Walbert was so hyperactive that sitting still in class or standing in line was an achievement.

But on a recent afternoon, the waif-like 10-year-old was a statuesque study in poise. Not only was she standing still, she was doing it on the back of a moving horse, more than five feet off the ground, her arms at full extension, her knees gently bending with the motion of the large animal beneath her.

“There is a magic between the horses and the vaulters,” said Virginia Manges, watching near a fenced Lake View Terrace horse ring. “It gives the vaulters a self-assuredness. They can do something someone else can’t do.”

Manges, 53, is the manager of Valley View Vaulters, a nonprofit organization that for 13 years has taught the art of vaulting--gymnastics on the back of a moving horse.

Although most of its students are not handicapped, Valley View has made a point of welcoming those who are. Children with all manner of mental and physical problems--from autism to cerebral palsy--have taken naturally to a sport that might tax the nerves of the most able-bodied.

The organization’s head coach, Rick Hawthorne, lost an arm to bone cancer when he was 11. After that, trying to join in sports with his peers was an exercise in frustration.

Hawthorne took up vaulting in 1977 while studying for a degree in animal science at Cal Poly Pomona and has achieved a bronze medal rating, the third highest, in a sport that was staged as a demonstration event at the 1984 Olympics in Los Angeles. As a teacher of the handicapped, he believes in treating his students the same as he would anyone else.

“We make no special allowances for the handicapped,” he said. “No one’s out there saying you have to do it a little differently.”

Previously based at stables in the northeast San Fernando Valley communities of Sunland and Tujunga, Valley View conducts classes in neighboring Lake View Terrace on a property it acquired in November.

During the lesson, a 17-hand Percheron draft horse named Molly circled the ring as Hawthorne guided her with a long rein. One by one, the children trotted beside the horse, grabbed a leather loop dangling from her flank and hauled themselves onto a strap across her back. They performed several maneuvers, turning 360 degrees or balancing on one knee.

Anne-Marie, fresh from performing her stand on Molly’s back, was full of vaulting ambition. “I’ll stick at it until I’m gold (rated),” she said. “I want to see if I can make it to the world championships.”