SUMMERDALE, Ala. - Carli Hodges, a 12-year-old student at Summerdale School, may not immediately strike you as a world champion, but looks can be deceiving. The same could be said of her 21-year-old quarter horse, Jet Passem Up, or Jet for short.

Hodges is diminutive and soft spoken, and Jet, aside from not saying anything, will barely look you in the eye. But forgive them – it’s somewhere around 95 degrees outside, school just started, and there are no races this weekend. If there were, Carli and Jet would surely be there, and then you’d be able to see the world champion barrel racers in action.

The National Barrel Horse Association, based in Augusta, Ga., hosts an annual competition it calls “the largest youth barrel race in the world.” Carli and Jet have competed – and medaled – in years past, but despite Carli’s youth and Jet’s advanced age, in this year’s field of 660 horse and rider teams, they came out on top.

Carli said there are no standard dimensions for a barrel racing course, but as a rider, her goal is consistent. She must guide Jet around three barrels in a specific pattern. The horse and rider are timed as they run full tilt out of the gate, around the three barrels, and then back through the gate. Time is deducted if the pattern is not followed or if the barrels are knocked over.

At this year’s NBHA World Youth Championship July 25-30 in Jackson, Miss., Carli and Jet stumbled over the second barrel, but still posed a time of 15.343 seconds – fast enough to win her division.

“He’s old but he’s fast,” Carli said of Jet, whose running style she credited for helping win the championship. “All horses have a different way of turning,” she said. “He doesn’t really get in the dirt the way some horses do, he sort of spins around standing up.”

Carli’s mother Lynn said Jet’s performance at his age is remarkable. “He’s the equivalent of 70 years old for a human,” she said. “That’s what makes it even more special. Plus the fact that he used to belong to my sister.”

Carli has been riding Jet since she was nine. The Hodges acquired the horse from Frances Holt-Jones, a breeder in Foley, but he originally belonged to Carli’s aunt and had spent his early years on the rodeo circuit in Mississippi and Texas. Jet has been barrel racing his entire life, and as the championship proves, still has enthusiasm for the sport.

“He knows what to do so I don’t train him anymore,” Carli said. “I just exercise him regularly and guide him through the course.”

Carli, who has been riding horses since she was a toddler and raced a pony prior to Jet, said she would consider making a career out of barrel racing. Every month, she attends preliminary barrel races in Bay Minette to earn points toward invitations to statewide and the national events. After next year’s competition, she will move up from the youth division to the teen division, and then on to the professional level.

For winning the world championship last month, Carli won a cash prize, the use of a NBHA trailer for a year, and a commemorative saddle and belt buckles, among other things. The NBHA has members in every state and five continents, and competitors from 34 states and Canada, Italy and Australia participated in July’s championship.

“We’re really proud of her,” Lynn said of her daughter. “She loves that horse and they both work hard for everything they get.”