NO HORSING AROUND
"They have show names too. Budgee is known as Quango. He's my best horse. He steps in the ring and he knows what his job is." Matthew Dickey
AMP Scholarship winner
When Mathew Dickey isn’t designing drinking water systems, he’s training to become New Zealand’s best horseman.
The 27-year-old Oa¯ kura man has for five years maintained a civil structural engineering role with New Plymouth’s BTW Company but recently dropped to two days a week to focus on his horse riding aspirations.
‘‘If I do well in sporting then I can become a positive role model and hopefully inspire others to follow their passion,’’ he said.
The first step toward his goals was winning a $5000 regional scholarship from financial services company AMP last week.
Regional winners are automatically placed in the People’s Choice category, which could earn them another $5000 prize.
Dickey is up against eight other New Zealanders and currently sits in third place, behind another equestrian from Rothbury and a Gisborne woman wanting to tackle youth suicide rates.
Dickey found his love for horses at a young age, picking up the hobby from parents, Jen Blyde and Phil Dickey.
‘‘But I also liked building things with Lego, so I went down the career path and became a civil engineer.’’
Though Dickey took up a position at BTW he never stopped training his horses, often riding until 9.30pm once home from work, he said.
But surgery on his shoulder in the winter left Dickey sitting at home with nothing to do but think.
‘‘I was three months off the horses,’’ he said. ‘‘And I just decided it was something I really wanted to go for.’’
Dickey has scaled back to a part-time role and has upped his time at the family facilities to better train his seven horses: Budgee, Cooper, Billy, Jeepers, Cherry, Indie and Fernando.
‘‘They have show names too. Budgee is known as Quango. He’s my best horse.
‘‘He steps in the ring and he knows what his job is.’’
Though Dickey said his parents were supporting him through his career transition, he was working hard to create new financial avenues, which would be selling horses, riding other people’s horses, and training riders.
‘‘But I’ve got to get more stables and improve the track - horses are a lot of money.’’
❚ People’s Choice voting is open until 22 October at amp.co.nz. The winner will be announced at an awards event in Auckland on 26 October.