Jessica Springsteen Is Jumping for the Gold
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Jessica Springsteen is a true horse girlie. The professional show jumper, who began riding at age five, is in the middle of her monthslong, four-continent-spanning Longines Global Championship Tour, and she is jumping for the gold as she prepares for this summer’s Paris Olympics.
The equestrian It girl—who just happens to be the daughter of music legend Bruce Springsteen and his wife of over 30 years, fellow singer Patti Scialfa—is fresh off a string of stellar performances with her team, the Stockholm Hearts, who won big at the Miami Beach championships this April and are now spending the summer competing in Europe. At the end of May, the 32-year-old Springsteen will head to Rome to jump at the historic Piazza di Siena; and in July, we expect to see her on the Olympic course at the Palace of Versailles.
“Tokyo 2020 was such an incredible experience, but because of that year and all the COVID-19 pandemic restrictions, you know, you couldn't have your family and your friends there,” Springsteen says as we catch up following her Miami win. “So I was like, oh my gosh, I would love to go to another Olympics and be able to share that with my family who’ve been so supportive of my career for so many years.”
Spingsteen earned a silver medal in the Tokyo, and in the years since, her fearless riding, impeccable form, and sophisticated ensembles have made her a favorite on the course. Plus... she’s stunning and casually hilarious.
“As a kid I was obsessed with those horse girl book series,” I tell her. “Oh my god, no, me too!” she says. Of course, she took that love of ponies a little further. “My mom had always wanted to ride when she was younger, so when I was a kid, we moved to Cologne, New Jersey, and our house was right across the street from this big junior training stable,” she explains. “So, I grew up with the horses and I more just loved to be around them in the beginning, and taking care of them. I was actually a little nervous to ride, but then I started training and just kind of went from there.”
Her first horse was a beautiful gray pony she named Shamrock. “He was the best pony. I’d be riding him around and he would stop and go down to eat grass and I would, like, fall over his head,” she recalls, laughing. “We had to put these like protective reins on the side so that he couldn’t do it, because I kept just falling right over him. But he was so cute. He had a little bit of an attitude and he kept me on my toes.”
Now, she travels all over the world with her world-class competition horses—among them her biggest winner, Belgian warmblood stallion Don Juan van de Donkhoeve, as well as gelding Cayman de Poteau Z, and pretty white mare Naomi van het Keizershof—and chooses which one to ride based on the type of course, venue, and event. “Some horses prefer competing on grass or sand,” she says.
The bond she has with the animals is one of the most important parts of the sport, where there are two athletes—the human and the horse—and they both rely on one another. “That's the best thing about it and also the hardest thing about it, because you could be feeling your best one day and maybe your horse isn’t,” Springsteen notes.
It’s a relationship that doesn’t always come easily. “I would say it takes at least a full year to really get to know a horse, and I’ve had some horses where it takes a lot longer for me to figure them out and for them to figure me out. You’re working with them every day and riding them almost every day, but that trust doesn’t come overnight,” she says. “And horses, they want to try to figure out what you’re asking them. They’re always trying to work with you. So, I think patience is the number one thing I’ve learned from competing and doing the sport my entire life.”
Springsteen has indeed spent more of her life on a horse than not, and yet, the competition nerves never fully go away.
“I feel like, for me, just spending a little bit of time, even if it’s just five minutes, alone where I’m visualizing my round, envisioning myself jumping the course and going over every little detail is really helpful to get me in the zone. And it’s also about the relationship you have with your horse and trying to anticipate what is gonna happen when you get in the ring,” she says. “If I’m competing at night, I try to do a little workout or just move my body a little bit beforehand. I’ve also worked with a few different sports psychologists over the years and what’s helped me the most actually is reading a lot of sports psychology books and learning how to stay focused and centered.”
“And once I’m in the ring, I’m fine,” she adds. “It’s the lead-up that gets me a little nervous. But they say they say nerves are just excitement, right?”
When I see her in Miami, Springsteen looks like she walked straight out of a Tommy Hilfiger catalog—and just as well, because they used to sponsor her. She wears a crisp white button-down casually rolled up at the sleeves, blue mom jeans ripped at the knees, and black leather woven sandals.
À la quiet luxury, she accessorizes simply with white diamond studs, dainty gold necklaces, a rouge manicure, and barely-there makeup. In this magazine, we use the term effortlessly chic quite often, but there’s no other way to describe Springsteen’s style, which exudes ease and class and down-to-earth coolness all at once.
“I feel like this was the wrong choice of outfit for the sweaty Miami heat,” she jokes as soon as we meet. The white shirt is a staple of equestrian style, and therefore of Springsteen’s wardrobe, but this is one of the few times she is not in Parlanti or Cavallo boots and a fitted blazer.
“It's so funny, when I was younger, my friends would come over and try on my breeches and they'd be like, Oh my gosh, like you should be wearing these out at night! And I was like, You guys are crazy. And I remember I was like I cannot put another blazer on, like, I compete in them every single day,” Springsteen says. “But now that I’m older, I really lean into it and I love it. It used to be a very strict uniform, but it’s fun now because I feel like people are going outside the box and adding more fun details to their looks, and it’s nice to see that.”
Her go-to riding fit includes a fitted white shirt, matching riding pants cinched with a black leather belt, a red or navy blazer, and knee-high black leather boots with magnets that attach to the stirrups. She perfectly matches her helmet and gloves, plus her horse’s accessories, to the look of the day, and adds some shine with her diamond studs. And when she’s off the horse, Springsteen is still a horse girlie, she says, “Especially now that the cowboy and equestrian-girl looks are in, I fully lean in.”
As for her simple beauty look while riding, Springsteen jokes that she has “like three layers of sunscreen on” at all times. “I’m really into just hydration—hydrating my skin and hydrating myself. I love the Supergoop Glowscreen, and then I’ll do like a tinted moisturizer with sunscreen in that as well. Recently, I’ve been using the Chanel Water-Fresh foundation—it’s just so light it doesn’t look like you have anything on your skin, and they just made a blush like that as well and I’m really loving. And then for hair, I mean, since we have our helmets on all day, dry shampoo is my best friend.”
We love a relatable queen.
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