Festive_Felicitations
Well-Known Member
After our DR outing back in May around Hunting we have had a few more lessons and Beau has been feeling, and going very well so I decided we were going to have a crack Elementary! 
We were going to have a crack a few years ago but he went lame and since then it has just not been realistic. But after having had the summer (mine) off with a bad back and spending a small fortune on physio he has come back better than he has ever been or has been in years!
So 5 weeks ago I decided to enter and I put Beau and I on our equivalent of DR boot camp - 1 lesson a week
We could do to some degree everything but travers - and 5 weeks is plenty of time to learn right?
Preparations - new shoes!
Drove the 3hrs north (breaking the 6hr drive to parentals with a sleep over and DR comp) to the showgrounds and unloaded and it proceed to rain - solidly - for the next 4 hrs. Beau and I actually dried off after I got on! I don't have any photos from the test but it was an informal / no plaiting day so picture me in semitransparent white johds, stock, and Dry-z-bone (http://www.countryloversstore.com/acatalog/M_DrizaBone_Full_Length.jpg) and Beau looking like a drying out drowned rat with legs and the bottom 1/2 of his tail liberally coated in mud and grey sand. Matchy matchy mud?
Got on and gone are the days of needing to warm up for 40+ mins, 20mins and we were ready to go!
Trotted round the arena feeling very poncy down the centreline and accelerated towards X but managed a civilised halt and the mandatory nose blow. Rest of the test was IMHO bloody brilliant! We did everything where we were meant to, he tried, if he got a bit tense I could ride him and get him to soften by the end of the movement (mainly the shoulder-in and travers). We lost marks because there was tension, I didn't use the corners to set him up as well as I could and rode the canter work conservatively as I was worried about ending up on our faces in the mud. Scores ranged from 4 to 7's and we came out with 53.5% and came 5/5 and got a pretty lilac ribbon. My goal was to break 50% so very
After the test the judge got out of her car, commented on what a nice horse Beau is and how much potential he has *proud face* (but they have been saying that for years!
) and gave me a crash course lesson in riding the canter in tests for max marks and he went really nicely and she said that 'that' canter would have got us 8 & 9s in the test!)
There was 5 min break and I went straight in to do our 2nd test a Novice. Now by all rights given how he had gone in the Elem and how he has been schooling he should have been able to score minimum of 6s all though this test - please note the 'should have'. I don't know who swapped my fairly-lazy-when-in-the-presence-of-white-boards horse with the horse that came down the centreline but from the word go it became apparent the test was going to be a matter of staying in the arena and preferably in the right gear. First diagonal of 'show lengthened strides' was 1/2 an arena of extended trot before I thought I'd better try and stop as we were picking up speed and locked on the white boards and open space beyond. First leg yield - leg on to suggest lateral movement and I got a pretty good attempt at canter half pass. Giving him his head for the free walk = setting off at a decent 'hunt' paced canter. It has to be one of the fastest tests I have ever done. Even when I managed to walk it was at warp speed...
I guess one of the pitfalls of doing Dressage when your horse is fit enough (and being fed accordingly) to whip-in once a week is that 2 tests on the trot (excuse the pun) has really only just warmed them up for the rest of the day... :rollseyes:
Despite all this apparently he wasn't showing much tension (judge must have missed the head toss objections to being asked to SLOW DOWN) and we scored 58.6% to come 3/6 and a pretty white ribbon
So after a somewhat grimbly start it was an absolutely wonderful day. But now for the bittersweet part - the last few months have been great for Beau and I he has been sound been going brilliantly and we have had great fun. But, on the 24th of June I fly out to Ghana to work for a year, it is a once in a life time opportunity and will be a wonderful experience but really the timing could have been better!
But I have ticked another goal off my bucket list - to say I can school a horse up to the dizzy heights of Elem DR and place in a competition (I'll ignore the 5/5 bit for now 
)
And now some photos:
As I have none of either test, a few from a lesson the other day: (and YES I am riding shockingly and have given myself a good beating up about it and tried very hard to keep my heels down, eyes up and shoulder back in the tests and from now on, but feel free to point out any further faults...)
Backing
Not the best photos but the only ones that would link...
Beau doing what he would much rather be doing than poncing in circles aka Hunting (with mum in this case)
And just cause he is a pretty poser -
We were going to have a crack a few years ago but he went lame and since then it has just not been realistic. But after having had the summer (mine) off with a bad back and spending a small fortune on physio he has come back better than he has ever been or has been in years! So 5 weeks ago I decided to enter and I put Beau and I on our equivalent of DR boot camp - 1 lesson a week
We could do to some degree everything but travers - and 5 weeks is plenty of time to learn right? Preparations - new shoes!
Drove the 3hrs north (breaking the 6hr drive to parentals with a sleep over and DR comp) to the showgrounds and unloaded and it proceed to rain - solidly - for the next 4 hrs. Beau and I actually dried off after I got on! I don't have any photos from the test but it was an informal / no plaiting day so picture me in semitransparent white johds, stock, and Dry-z-bone (http://www.countryloversstore.com/acatalog/M_DrizaBone_Full_Length.jpg) and Beau looking like a drying out drowned rat with legs and the bottom 1/2 of his tail liberally coated in mud and grey sand. Matchy matchy mud?
Got on and gone are the days of needing to warm up for 40+ mins, 20mins and we were ready to go!
Trotted round the arena feeling very poncy down the centreline and accelerated towards X but managed a civilised halt and the mandatory nose blow. Rest of the test was IMHO bloody brilliant! We did everything where we were meant to, he tried, if he got a bit tense I could ride him and get him to soften by the end of the movement (mainly the shoulder-in and travers). We lost marks because there was tension, I didn't use the corners to set him up as well as I could and rode the canter work conservatively as I was worried about ending up on our faces in the mud. Scores ranged from 4 to 7's and we came out with 53.5% and came 5/5 and got a pretty lilac ribbon. My goal was to break 50% so very After the test the judge got out of her car, commented on what a nice horse Beau is and how much potential he has *proud face* (but they have been saying that for years!
) and gave me a crash course lesson in riding the canter in tests for max marks and he went really nicely and she said that 'that' canter would have got us 8 & 9s in the test!)There was 5 min break and I went straight in to do our 2nd test a Novice. Now by all rights given how he had gone in the Elem and how he has been schooling he should have been able to score minimum of 6s all though this test - please note the 'should have'. I don't know who swapped my fairly-lazy-when-in-the-presence-of-white-boards horse with the horse that came down the centreline but from the word go it became apparent the test was going to be a matter of staying in the arena and preferably in the right gear. First diagonal of 'show lengthened strides' was 1/2 an arena of extended trot before I thought I'd better try and stop as we were picking up speed and locked on the white boards and open space beyond. First leg yield - leg on to suggest lateral movement and I got a pretty good attempt at canter half pass. Giving him his head for the free walk = setting off at a decent 'hunt' paced canter. It has to be one of the fastest tests I have ever done. Even when I managed to walk it was at warp speed...
I guess one of the pitfalls of doing Dressage when your horse is fit enough (and being fed accordingly) to whip-in once a week is that 2 tests on the trot (excuse the pun) has really only just warmed them up for the rest of the day... :rollseyes:
Despite all this apparently he wasn't showing much tension (judge must have missed the head toss objections to being asked to SLOW DOWN) and we scored 58.6% to come 3/6 and a pretty white ribbon
So after a somewhat grimbly start it was an absolutely wonderful day. But now for the bittersweet part - the last few months have been great for Beau and I he has been sound been going brilliantly and we have had great fun. But, on the 24th of June I fly out to Ghana to work for a year, it is a once in a life time opportunity and will be a wonderful experience but really the timing could have been better!
But I have ticked another goal off my bucket list - to say I can school a horse up to the dizzy heights of Elem DR and place in a competition
(I'll ignore the 5/5 bit for now )And now some photos:
As I have none of either test, a few from a lesson the other day: (and YES I am riding shockingly and have given myself a good beating up about it and tried very hard to keep my heels down, eyes up and shoulder back in the tests and from now on, but feel free to point out any further faults...)
Backing
Not the best photos but the only ones that would link...
Beau doing what he would much rather be doing than poncing in circles aka Hunting (with mum in this case)
And just cause he is a pretty poser -
