khalswitz
Well-Known Member
So, as was decided after much discussion with the HHO forum, Geoff and I had an attempt at our first Novice unaffiliated yesterday in addition to our second BD outing at Prelim. A friend was taking us and doing the Novice, so saved her having to go too early, and whilst we were aware we weren’t ready for Novice, we figured it wouldn’t do us any active harm - worst case scenario it would be confirmed we need more time at Prelim.
In preparation for such an momentous outing, and celebrating Geoff now being a proper dressage hoss (
), we bought some new BLING from Equiture:
Yum
Now we tried very hard not to think about doing a Novice, particularly as it was a mainly BD event running some unaff alongside, and therefore marked by BD judges, so not necessarily encouraging… however regretted on Wednesday not having at least looked at the test before then, as the Novice 24 looked absolutely impossible: ridiculous loops (thanks HHO for clearing those up!), medium trot and canter, give and retake in canter, change of canter lead through one horse’s length of trot… basically terrifying. However Geoff was surprisingly workmanlike about practising some new moves, so whilst it might not be pretty it wouldn’t be totally horrendous and undoable…
We had it in our heads that we wanted a 62+ in the Prelim 15, and a 58+ in the Nov 24 - that would be a successful day, with his first Area sheet and a not-totally-shocking first bash at a level I didn’t really feel prepared for.
Morning of the comp came, and all hell broke loose. JUST prior to us loading up, the horse in the box opposite, currently on box rest, managed to barge past it’s owner and cause mayhem, galloping up and down the yard, literally running someone over and almost escaping onto the main road as someone had left the front gate open. The boys were WILD when we came back from helping catch the blighter, and my friend’s horse, once loaded in the box, went into panic mode and threw himself against the partition, collapsing his back end and getting stuck.
We got them both out, but she decided it wasn’t worth trying to take him as he was obviously very upset. I told her not to worry, we’d get there another time, but she (and her lovely dad who was with us!) said not to be ridiculous, they’d come with us, and that we’d better bloomin’ win. (In return I went with her today to groom for her as she got a withdrawn slot to sit the same tests!!)
Geoff was calmer than my friend’s horse, but a new venue and all the excitement beforehand left me with a very… *lit up* horse when we arrived. He was very looky and on his toes in the warm up, but no badness, and really trying to concentrate, just a little distracted.
Took him into the indoor for the P15, and things got even more exciting. He always has a good LOOK on going into an indoor, and this coincided perfectly with someone slamming a door directly next to us causing a huge spook across the arena. However, my increase in confidence with him definitely shone through, and instead of backing off and sitting, I put him straight into canter and gave him a good forward canter round before entering at A. He is MUCH happier after a canter, and doesn’t get tense like in the trot.
Test itself wasn’t one of our best, but probably an average test for him. He was head nodding quite a bit - this is his new *thing*, particularly when I set my wrists and go zombie-arms instead of actually riding him forward into soft but consistent contact. He was also hollowing quite a bit in the canter trans - again me collapsing my core and not riding him properly. However, unlike last time we did this test, he didn’t just decide to gallop off like a giraffe in the middle of the test, so that was a plus. Another affiliated test under our belts, and not nearly as horrible feeling as the previous attempt at BD when he needed to pee…
Here is the vid - CC much appreciated!
[video=youtube_share;3Mof7G7iwj4]http://youtu.be/3Mof7G7iwj4[/video]
And some stills:
Warmed up much looser and less distracted second time, and thanks to ring steward letting us into the outdoor arena for the Novice before the judge was back, we got a good canter and a nice free walk round to get Geoff settled before the bell was rung. Sneaky
I really didn’t have high expectations at all, but you know what? I came out grinning. I think having more to do and think about stopped me over-riding him - and you know what? Geoff responded. It was far from perfect - whilst the first medium trot (usually very tense) was lovely, the second one I didn’t really ask for enough, and same with the medium canter. He came above the bit in every canter trans, although I did get him back in between, and he is obviously a bit laterally stiff through the loops, but he tried very hard and worked WITH me which was lovely.
Vid here: again, CC much appreciated
[video=youtube_share;uncAL9sXnek]http://youtu.be/uncAL9sXnek[/video]
And stills:
All in all, came out thinking it was not bad, and that we do need to start trying to work at this level...
And after an epic long wait, the sheets came out. In the P15, we scored 65.87 and came 10/20. Scores were all very close, with one % more we’d have had 6th, and we scored the same as 8th and 9th places, just lower collectives. However considering the 59 and 60 last time at BD, I was very pleased with this, and back smack in the middle of the pack shows we really are right to be competing affiliated, not just thinking we are!! That score also means our first sheet for Areas!!
Then, the Novice. Well, blow me down with a hummingbird feather - 66.54%. Judge’s comments LOVELY - said he had a nice rhythm and nice forward paces, just needed to come through more, and not lose himself in the canter trans. “Lots to like”.
The Novice unaff class had 5 in the class and we came 2nd and therefore with our 65+ score and 2nd placing managed to find ourselves qualified for the North East Championships held by the local dressage group who run the main BD comps in the area. In the Novice . Over the moon to have qualified, although I don't think we'll be able to go as local box hire place is booked up and no one from my yard has qualified
I also compared our scores to the Novice Restricted scores, and out of 12 entries we'd have placed 4th had we been competing in that section. So very chuffed - we would even have been competitive against affiliated Novice combinations, with the restricted section winner being only 3% above us (and regular competitors at that level since last year).
So, am very full after eating my words that Geoff is no where near ready to do a Novice (think my perfectionist side was coming out again). We are entered for 2 BD prelims next weekend, but next month may consider trying another few unaff Novice tests before considering whether we need to spend some pennies and get him fully registered and do Novice...
Our biggest stumbling block will always be rein back - he struggles to back up even on the ground, mainly due to the shivering - but have been teaching him to take 2 steps back with me on him mainly for doing gates etc, so whilst we’ll have to avoid tests with rein back for the meantime, we can aim towards at least a 5’s worth of rein back with practice I’m hoping. So maybe Novice isn’t so far away after all!!
Here’s our sheets and lovely frilly
Cheesecake and fresh strawberries on offer, yum
In preparation for such an momentous outing, and celebrating Geoff now being a proper dressage hoss (
), we bought some new BLING from Equiture:
Yum
Now we tried very hard not to think about doing a Novice, particularly as it was a mainly BD event running some unaff alongside, and therefore marked by BD judges, so not necessarily encouraging… however regretted on Wednesday not having at least looked at the test before then, as the Novice 24 looked absolutely impossible: ridiculous loops (thanks HHO for clearing those up!), medium trot and canter, give and retake in canter, change of canter lead through one horse’s length of trot… basically terrifying. However Geoff was surprisingly workmanlike about practising some new moves, so whilst it might not be pretty it wouldn’t be totally horrendous and undoable…
We had it in our heads that we wanted a 62+ in the Prelim 15, and a 58+ in the Nov 24 - that would be a successful day, with his first Area sheet and a not-totally-shocking first bash at a level I didn’t really feel prepared for.
Morning of the comp came, and all hell broke loose. JUST prior to us loading up, the horse in the box opposite, currently on box rest, managed to barge past it’s owner and cause mayhem, galloping up and down the yard, literally running someone over and almost escaping onto the main road as someone had left the front gate open. The boys were WILD when we came back from helping catch the blighter, and my friend’s horse, once loaded in the box, went into panic mode and threw himself against the partition, collapsing his back end and getting stuck.
We got them both out, but she decided it wasn’t worth trying to take him as he was obviously very upset. I told her not to worry, we’d get there another time, but she (and her lovely dad who was with us!) said not to be ridiculous, they’d come with us, and that we’d better bloomin’ win. (In return I went with her today to groom for her as she got a withdrawn slot to sit the same tests!!)
Geoff was calmer than my friend’s horse, but a new venue and all the excitement beforehand left me with a very… *lit up* horse when we arrived. He was very looky and on his toes in the warm up, but no badness, and really trying to concentrate, just a little distracted.
Took him into the indoor for the P15, and things got even more exciting. He always has a good LOOK on going into an indoor, and this coincided perfectly with someone slamming a door directly next to us causing a huge spook across the arena. However, my increase in confidence with him definitely shone through, and instead of backing off and sitting, I put him straight into canter and gave him a good forward canter round before entering at A. He is MUCH happier after a canter, and doesn’t get tense like in the trot.
Test itself wasn’t one of our best, but probably an average test for him. He was head nodding quite a bit - this is his new *thing*, particularly when I set my wrists and go zombie-arms instead of actually riding him forward into soft but consistent contact. He was also hollowing quite a bit in the canter trans - again me collapsing my core and not riding him properly. However, unlike last time we did this test, he didn’t just decide to gallop off like a giraffe in the middle of the test, so that was a plus
. Another affiliated test under our belts, and not nearly as horrible feeling as the previous attempt at BD when he needed to pee… Here is the vid - CC much appreciated!
[video=youtube_share;3Mof7G7iwj4]http://youtu.be/3Mof7G7iwj4[/video]
And some stills:
Warmed up much looser and less distracted second time, and thanks to ring steward letting us into the outdoor arena for the Novice before the judge was back, we got a good canter and a nice free walk round to get Geoff settled before the bell was rung. Sneaky
I really didn’t have high expectations at all, but you know what? I came out grinning. I think having more to do and think about stopped me over-riding him - and you know what? Geoff responded. It was far from perfect - whilst the first medium trot (usually very tense) was lovely, the second one I didn’t really ask for enough, and same with the medium canter. He came above the bit in every canter trans, although I did get him back in between, and he is obviously a bit laterally stiff through the loops, but he tried very hard and worked WITH me which was lovely.
Vid here: again, CC much appreciated
[video=youtube_share;uncAL9sXnek]http://youtu.be/uncAL9sXnek[/video]
And stills:
All in all, came out thinking it was not bad, and that we do need to start trying to work at this level...
And after an epic long wait, the sheets came out. In the P15, we scored 65.87 and came 10/20. Scores were all very close, with one % more we’d have had 6th, and we scored the same as 8th and 9th places, just lower collectives. However considering the 59 and 60 last time at BD, I was very pleased with this, and back smack in the middle of the pack shows we really are right to be competing affiliated, not just thinking we are!! That score also means our first sheet for Areas!!
Then, the Novice. Well, blow me down with a hummingbird feather - 66.54%. Judge’s comments LOVELY - said he had a nice rhythm and nice forward paces, just needed to come through more, and not lose himself in the canter trans. “Lots to like”.
The Novice unaff class had 5 in the class and we came 2nd
and therefore with our 65+ score and 2nd placing managed to find ourselves qualified for the North East Championships held by the local dressage group who run the main BD comps in the area. In the Novice . Over the moon to have qualified, although I don't think we'll be able to go as local box hire place is booked up and no one from my yard has qualified I also compared our scores to the Novice Restricted scores, and out of 12 entries we'd have placed 4th had we been competing in that section. So very chuffed
- we would even have been competitive against affiliated Novice combinations, with the restricted section winner being only 3% above us (and regular competitors at that level since last year).So, am very full after eating my words that Geoff is no where near ready to do a Novice (think my perfectionist side was coming out again). We are entered for 2 BD prelims next weekend, but next month may consider trying another few unaff Novice tests before considering whether we need to spend some pennies and get him fully registered and do Novice...
Our biggest stumbling block will always be rein back - he struggles to back up even on the ground, mainly due to the shivering - but have been teaching him to take 2 steps back with me on him mainly for doing gates etc, so whilst we’ll have to avoid tests with rein back for the meantime, we can aim towards at least a 5’s worth of rein back with practice I’m hoping. So maybe Novice isn’t so far away after all!!
Here’s our sheets and lovely frilly
Cheesecake and fresh strawberries on offer, yum
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