With the Super Bowl fast approaching this weekend, GoHorseShow wanted to spotlight a horse and rider team who combines football and horses in their every-day life. Kansas City Chief cheerleader, Susie Derouchey, with help from her horse trainer, AQHA judge and all-around horse trainer, Merle Arbo, of Kingsville, Missouri, prepare “Warpaint” for the electric atmosphere at Arrowhead Stadium for eight home games a year.
It is not uncommon for a noise or movement to effect your ride in the show pen. So how does Susie and Merle prepare Warpaint for the loud noises of the avid fans, fireworks, flapping flags, and dodging in and out of the players? Susie and Warpaint must be prepared not just for the home games, but community events, school presentations and parades they attend every year.
“It is definitely challenging to prepare a horse for more than 70,000 screaming fans,” says Arbo, who trains many different breeds for all-around events, including Pintos, Quarter Horses, Palominos, and Paints.
“The Chiefs organization picked Warpaint more for her colorful markings than her training, so, I put some extra cues on her. I worked on getting her to neck rein better, and also put some brakes on her so Susie can stop her a lot quicker,” he explains. “We were also very lucky because the mare has a great mind and disposition.”
Arbo explains in detail that he would shoot off guns, bottle rockets, fireworks, and beat on drums at his farm to try and simulate a gameday atmosphere, but he says it is impossible to prepare for an atmosphere that intense. “Susie makes it look really easy but it is quite difficult having to maneuver around so many people and rein one-handed in that loud of a stadium while holding a flag in the other hand,” he says. “Susie has a lot of nerve to be able to ride in that chaotic type of condition.”
The World Champion trainer says that he enjoys his job with the Chiefs because it involves horses, but it is vastly different than the horse show world. “I enjoy the challenges,” he says. “There is not a textbook answer for some of the problems we face and sometimes we have to improvise as we go along.”
Arbo says they have a lot of fun at the events dressing Warpaint up in
fun costumes. For Halloween, they dressed the paint mare up like a
referee, and on pink-themed game day, they decorated her in pink bows
and a pink saddle pad to bring awareness to breast cancer.
Merle talked to us about their gameday routine. “The mare has a stall in the tunnel and we have to wait in there and come out really quick when the Chiefs score. Sometimes we have to scramble to get ready if they fake a punt or score unexpectedly, but most of the time, we keep up pretty well. There is no place to warm her up, and Susie and Warpaint have to immediately run out of the tunnel onto the field without any practice, so, it is an adrenaline rush!”
Susie, who also competes on the APHA circuit with her horse, Nobody But Me, says that she enjoys working with Merle. Due to his show background, the NFL cheerleader says that Arbo knows the type of horse she likes to ride.
“He makes my job look easy,” she says. “I try to go over to his place and ride her once or twice a week. We try to keep Warpaint on her toes by taking her on trail rides to keep her mind fresh. The 14 year-old mare can be surrounded by 450 kids at the same time, and she is completely tolerant of the entire situation. She just loves people.”
The same can be said about Susie and Warpaint. The fans love them. During the Packers and Chiefs home game, Susie and Warpaint kept the crowd pumped and excited even though they were 11-point underdogs in their home stadium to the Packers. “It is such an amazing feeling to be right in the midst of the action—horses and football; there is nothing better than that!”
