spookypony
Well-Known Member
With the madness of work in the last few weeks, I didn't manage to enter the Spooky Pony for dressage this weekend, which is ok, because we've got lots of work to do. So I schooled him in the morning, and then went with a girl from our lesson to find her some show gear: she's joined the uni "modern pentathlon" team, and couldn't avoid buying a jacket any longer. A trip to buy a show jacket (delighted to find that a very reasonable navy Dublin one fit her best) turned into her getting a new body protector, plaiting bands, a crop, show shirt, lovely cream-and-gold stock and pin, and a fancy navy-and-gold saddlecloth...shopping with me is very dangerous.
Then we had a massive Scottish brekky at Morrison's, so the morning was good!
Evening was SJ at the riding school. We're between leagues at the moment, so I want to try different horses before I settle on one for the league. For the winter league, I had a 16.3 chestnut mare that really, really knows her job, can turn on a dime, and will manage even if you mess up a bit---a real confidence-builder---so I managed to win the 1m league and come 2nd in the 75cm.
Being the only one that consistently entered the 1m helped, too!
For the next league, I want to challenge myself by choosing something that takes more riding, but still not a no-hoper...being very girly, I do like ribbons.
For yesterday, I picked a 17h dark bay warmblood gelding, who is one of the better educated horses at the RS. He is quite forward, but a bit stiff, as he's not the youngest and has stringhalt. The challenge with him is to hold his very huge canter together, and it's very telling, as he's not the neatest jumper, and will knock poles flying if you don't sit up.
The RS is at the end of a long, low incline. The massive amounts of snow that had fallen since Friday morning had been well ironed into a completely slick surface, and I was unable to get a proper run up with my stupid little feather-light car---and started sliding backwards. Fortunately, the car is light enough that a bunch of kids (and a dad) were able to push it up---a long way up---to a level bit, so that I could make it. Unfortunately, this delay caused a whole bunch of other cars to end up in the same predicament. So a lot of people got well-exercised in pushing cars up that hill yesterday evening.
We took a lot of time for turnout: the uni girl had brought a groom (another uni girl that is a groom) to help her spiff up her chosen grey IDx, complete with navy-and-gold saddle-cloth. The prize for BTO in each class is usually a free class for the next show, so is hotly contested. Being the queen tail-plaiter, I helped out the competition in that capacity.
Despite the weather, no one had cancelled, and there were a few extra entries---which was good, since they were quite low, anyway. The first round of the 75cm was messy on my part: I was having a lot of trouble holding together his canter on the left rein, so had to come back to trot a few times, had a lot of trouble getting to the last jump because we jumped the previous one on a silly angle and landed on the wrong leg, and I had communications trouble over takeoffs. For some reason, we went clear anyway (probably because the jumps just about reached his knees), even though he knocked the last jump pretty hard. In the jump-off, I took what I thought was a short route, but the last jump appeared to have shuffled sideways to a rather inconvenient angle from where I remembered it, so we found ourselves weaving about in trot wasting time, trying to find where the d*** jump had waddled off to. Apparently, everyone else made the same mistake, though, so we managed to win anyways.
I was determined not to repeat the same errors in the 1m. There were only four of us entered, and the jumps were a little smaller than usual. Three got through to the jump-off (our first round was much cleaner), and the j-o course was the same as before. I thought about changing the route, but the longer route looked just as inconvenient as the short one, so I did the same weird route. I just managed to edge out the next competitor, for another win.
It's a shame this horse will be going on part-lease next month, so his leaser gets first dibs at jumping him, because I think there's lots for me to learn from him. But hey-ho, in the meantime, we'll work on the Spooky Pony, so maybe he'll eventually get his own little SJ report!
This seems to have wandered on for a while...so a big piece of lasagne if you get this far!
Then we had a massive Scottish brekky at Morrison's, so the morning was good!
Evening was SJ at the riding school. We're between leagues at the moment, so I want to try different horses before I settle on one for the league. For the winter league, I had a 16.3 chestnut mare that really, really knows her job, can turn on a dime, and will manage even if you mess up a bit---a real confidence-builder---so I managed to win the 1m league and come 2nd in the 75cm.
For yesterday, I picked a 17h dark bay warmblood gelding, who is one of the better educated horses at the RS. He is quite forward, but a bit stiff, as he's not the youngest and has stringhalt. The challenge with him is to hold his very huge canter together, and it's very telling, as he's not the neatest jumper, and will knock poles flying if you don't sit up.
The RS is at the end of a long, low incline. The massive amounts of snow that had fallen since Friday morning had been well ironed into a completely slick surface, and I was unable to get a proper run up with my stupid little feather-light car---and started sliding backwards. Fortunately, the car is light enough that a bunch of kids (and a dad) were able to push it up---a long way up---to a level bit, so that I could make it. Unfortunately, this delay caused a whole bunch of other cars to end up in the same predicament. So a lot of people got well-exercised in pushing cars up that hill yesterday evening.
We took a lot of time for turnout: the uni girl had brought a groom (another uni girl that is a groom) to help her spiff up her chosen grey IDx, complete with navy-and-gold saddle-cloth. The prize for BTO in each class is usually a free class for the next show, so is hotly contested. Being the queen tail-plaiter, I helped out the competition in that capacity.
Despite the weather, no one had cancelled, and there were a few extra entries---which was good, since they were quite low, anyway. The first round of the 75cm was messy on my part: I was having a lot of trouble holding together his canter on the left rein, so had to come back to trot a few times, had a lot of trouble getting to the last jump because we jumped the previous one on a silly angle and landed on the wrong leg, and I had communications trouble over takeoffs. For some reason, we went clear anyway (probably because the jumps just about reached his knees), even though he knocked the last jump pretty hard. In the jump-off, I took what I thought was a short route, but the last jump appeared to have shuffled sideways to a rather inconvenient angle from where I remembered it, so we found ourselves weaving about in trot wasting time, trying to find where the d*** jump had waddled off to. Apparently, everyone else made the same mistake, though, so we managed to win anyways.
I was determined not to repeat the same errors in the 1m. There were only four of us entered, and the jumps were a little smaller than usual. Three got through to the jump-off (our first round was much cleaner), and the j-o course was the same as before. I thought about changing the route, but the longer route looked just as inconvenient as the short one, so I did the same weird route. I just managed to edge out the next competitor, for another win.
It's a shame this horse will be going on part-lease next month, so his leaser gets first dibs at jumping him, because I think there's lots for me to learn from him. But hey-ho, in the meantime, we'll work on the Spooky Pony, so maybe he'll eventually get his own little SJ report!
This seems to have wandered on for a while...so a big piece of lasagne if you get this far!
