Maryanna Haymon, US Breeder of Top Horses Including Serenade MF, Suffers Severe Stroke
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April 19, 2023
Maryanna Haymon, an American breeder of top horses including Serenade MF that Alice Tarjan competed at the Omaha World Cup, has suffered a stroke and is rehabilitating at a hospital near her Marydell Farm in Columbus, North Carolina.
Maryanna was in Omaha to watch Alice ride Serenade (Sir Donnerhall x Don Principe), one of three American horse and rider combinations in the Final lineup. Alice and Serenade was also reserve combination for the American world championship team at Herning, Denmark last summer. Serenade is a 10-year-old mare.
“Specifically, she suffered a medullary infarction which resulted in marked right-sided involvement,” horse show photographer Sharon Packer who lives in the area reported. “She has been moved from acute care to rehab. Her cognition, vision and speech have not been affected. As with any severe stroke, fatigue is almost debilitating. Since she is right dominant and cannot use her right arm at this time, she is limited in being able to take phone calls and cannot text.”
In addition to Serenade, Maryanna bred Sonata MF, a full sister to Serenade that has been qualified by Amanda Perkowski for the U.S. seven-year-old championships.
Maryanna and her husband, Wendell Haymon, founded the breeding operation in 1997. He worked with Maryanna to establish Marydell as a top beeding operation near the Tryon International Equestrian Center that hosted the 2018 World Equestrian Games. Wendell died in 2020
Marydell has produced eight fully licensed and approved stallions with various registries.
The breeding stallion Don Principe was involved in the controversial pursuit by the International Equestrian Federation (FEI) over the finding of a banned substance in a supplement. The manufacturer admitted faulty production and supported almost two years of legal actions in the trans-Atlantic case.
A settlement was reached at the end of 2018 involving U.S. Under-25 rider Kaitlin Blythe and Don Principe, owned by Marydell Farm, and Olympic and World Games competitor Adrienne Lyle and Horizon, owned by Betsy Juliano. The settlement imposed a three-month suspension from April 5 to July 4, 2017.
Owners of both horses with the backing of the U.S. Equestrian Federation successfully rebuffed efforts by the FEI to strip the two combinations of 2017 Festival of Champions titles–Brentina Cup Under-25 for Kaitlin and Intermediate 1 for Adrienne that occurred within the suspension period.
