KEY POINTS:
Her first mount stands untethered on the porch of the family homestead in Waikato - a placid reminder of how it all began for showjumper Katie McVean.
"She used to get on that and try and tip it over, just rock and roll on it," said her father Jeff, reminiscing about the role an English-made rocking horse played in his youngest daughter's equestrian career.
"That's exactly where she started. The first thing she did was take the saddle and bridle off, she didn't need the reins - I'm sure it helped her a lot."
McVean has come along in leaps and bounds since those early days balancing on a birthday present.
Now, aged just 22, she is one of four New Zealand showjumpers aiming for a top eight placing in Hong Kong - the Beijing Olympic Games equine outpost.
While the rocking horse was a sedate introduction to the passion shared by her parents, McVean was soon climbing on to living, breathing horseflesh - Tonka and Skylight.
Those ponies - and lessons from her two-time Olympian father - allowed her to make a natural progression to full-blooded showjumpers such as Forest, the 17-year-old grey gelding she will ride in Hong Kong.
Belgian-bred Forest was brought to New Zealand as a seven-year-old by Natasha Slavich of Paeroa.
She had ridden him in Europe for three years and, when previous rider Lisa Coup's lease expired, wondered if McVean would be interested as a replacement.
"Forest was never in the picture until Lisa retired him before Christmas," Jeff McVean said.
His daughter was actually focused on preparing Dunstan Delphi for London in 2012.
"It's a big ask to do what she's doing," he admitted.
"Normally you would have jumped with the horse the season before."
However, his daughter's ability to quickly build a rapport with her mount has rarely been in question since she claimed her first pony grand prix as a nine year-old.
McVean and Forest promptly won the Olympic Cup at the prestigious Horse of The Year at Hastings in March - strengthening their claims for a place on the Olympic team.
"She's only 22 but she does get the chance to ride a lot of horses and she's always had a challenging one," her father said.
"The best start she could have got was have two brilliant ponies to begin with.
"They were absolute freaks, which made her believe she could do anything.
"If she was wrong on Tonka he'd take over. When she got Skylight he had to be ridden more but with the experience she had on Tonka, it was all a natural progression."
Of course dad, a professional showjumper in Europe for 14 years before relocating to his wife's Waikato domain in 1990, was also instrumental in her rapid rise - until usurped.
McVean, who rode at the Los Angeles Olympics in 1984 and again at Seoul four years later, was still riding when Katie and his eldest daughter Emma-Lee started out.
He promptly gave up when the younger McVean exceeded his expertise. That realisation arrived at Auckland's Alexandra Park, when both father and daughter were competing.
"I was trying to jump this horse and it wasn't doing that nice," said McVean, now a successful racehorse trainer based at Mystery Creek.
"I'd had a bad day the day before as well and then Katie got on it and made it look easy. That was enough for me, she was 12."
- NZPA
