Students hustle out of school as the final bell rings. Most head down to the locker room to change for practice, others into classrooms for club meetings. However, for Piper Grove ’26, afternoons look a little bit different.
Outside of school, Grove spends her time traveling between New York, Kentucky and Florida for horseback riding, a sport she’s been involved in since age five. Beginning just for fun at Salko Farm in Southport, her homebase has since become Findlay’s Ridge in Salem, New York.
“I started taking lessons when I was little and then began competing in third grade,” she said. “But when I was a sophomore I decided to move to a higher training barn.”
That decision has since served her well, with Grove earning a spot as a finalist in the Challenge Cup division at the New England Equitation Championships in 2024.
“It felt like a great culmination of all the work I had done throughout the season,” she said.
Her schedule is jam-packed no matter the season, with the winter being the most demanding. From late night flights to Florida and 12 straight weekends of competition, Grove has become a pro at time management.
“I would have to leave straight from last period and drive to the airport,” she said. “Sometimes I’d get home super late and still have to wake up to go to school the next morning.”
On top of the hours spent on riding, Grove also has to balance her substantial work-load and other extracurricular commitments, including running her own video-editing business (@piperreels on Instagram).
“Most of the girls I train with do online school because of how intense it can be,” she said, “but I still want to have a balanced life.”
Right now, Grove is gearing up for multiple national competitions, ones she spent the whole summer preparing for and is continuing to work towards.
“It’s super intense training,” Grove said. “I ride four times a week if there’s not a competition and am [at the barn] for six hours on the weekends.”
Despite all of the time and work she’s dedicated to the sport, Grove does not intend to continue it in college, hoping to find who she is outside of being an equestrian.
“I want to explore who I am in college,” she said, “and prioritize school and relationships over riding.”
