RC Champs ground conditions

I went to ALW thought ground was hard but other places have been just as hard its the good old british weather its never quite right. I thought they did a marvellous job organising so many classes.

Just wondered if any body else had a herd of ducks (there must have been about 50 -60) across the track just after fence 7, I had to slow down as there was a car that seemed to be trying to get them out of the way and the fence judge asking me if I was retiring as I was slowing down trying to avoid them. She said every one had to deal with them. How do you gallop through a herd of ducks!!!!!!!!

:rolleyes:
 
eccles alley said:
I went to ALW thought ground was hard but other places have been just as hard its the good old british weather its never quite right. I thought they did a marvellous job organising so many classes.

Just wondered if any body else had a herd of ducks (there must have been about 50 -60) across the track just after fence 7, I had to slow down as there was a car that seemed to be trying to get them out of the way and the fence judge asking me if I was retiring as I was slowing down trying to avoid them. She said every one had to deal with them. How do you gallop through a herd of ducks!!!!!!!!

:rolleyes:
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No ducks for me but a herd of belgians in their bright red baseball hats were huddled next to the intermediate fence 7 (just past the ** corner) as I approached, my horse spotted them an narrowly missed going sideways into the drainage ditch.
 
Agree whole heatedly with Casper, supagran and star! Yes it was firm but it's august, it's barely rained..... No matter what they do it's going to be firm! I thought a lot of effort went in. The sj looked rough but rode really very well. The only plce I thought was under prepped was dressage warm up, but it was rideable.

Thank you very much brc for a great weekend!
 
eccles alley said:
Just wondered if any body else had a herd of ducks (there must have been about 50 -60) across the track just after fence 7, I had to slow down as there was a car that seemed to be trying to get them out of the way and the fence judge asking me if I was retiring as I was slowing down trying to avoid them. She said every one had to deal with them. How do you gallop through a herd of ducks!!!!!!!!

:rolleyes:
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Yes had prob in Int on sat going down margin after brush at fence 8 ducks blocking track mare totally shocked went to spin round asking some people on foot tohelpmove them but reply was 'oo that would be outside assistance' have u heard such total rubbish!! took about 30 seconds to get through, did manage to get TF removed on sunday but V annoying as heard someone asking for them to be moved and (stewarded) when i came off R+T only to bump into them all 10mins later..

At end of day (Hr late due to 2* falls ect) ducks were all coming over to start ect of XC and had to keep being moved!!
 
Very glad to see that most of those who competed enjoyed it, & didn't have too many issues with the going - especially given the time of year & recent dry weather conditions.

I will certainly bring up the 'duck' situation & glad to hear the TPs were removed on appeal.
 
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I would say it's starting to become difficult when TPs are removed because of ducks. What would happen if say the ducks were on the landing side of a fence and a horse stopped because of them? Would the penalties be removed??

I have had difficulties with the ducks there before, but have always thought of it as a good schooling lesson for my horse!
 
The ducks do have a habit of being in an inopportune place at an inopportune moment at ALW so BRC really cannot take the blame for that!!

Saratoga - I've known them hold people at the start to move the ducks before for precisely the reason you say - they were on the landing side of the fence. If you were watching the 'herding' exercise, it was very amusing!
 
Well i had a really good time there. A very good experance for my first time. I ran in the open, so had to trap on to get the time and i had no worries with doing that (and i'm one, if i don't like the ground i will pull up as i will not risk my horse)
 
SpottedCat said:
Saratoga - I've known them hold people at the start to move the ducks before for precisely the reason you say - they were on the landing side of the fence. If you were watching the 'herding' exercise, it was very amusing!
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The reason I ask is because last year, or year before (can't remember which!) I had the flock of ducks on the landing side of the white rugby posts which my horse REALLY didn't want to jump. He duly went after a lot of encouragement from me, and was VERY careful about where he placed his feet on landing. But I have always wondered what would have happened if he had stopped at the fence?
 
Saratoga said:
The reason I ask is because last year, or year before (can't remember which!) I had the flock of ducks on the landing side of the white rugby posts which my horse REALLY didn't want to jump. He duly went after a lot of encouragement from me, and was VERY careful about where he placed his feet on landing. But I have always wondered what would have happened if he had stopped at the fence?
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Maybe some would say after this weekend, too careful?! ;)

Bit off of the fence judge not to get out of the car and at least attempt to shoo them off, I wonder what would have happened if you had stopped....suppose it depends on the fence judge's opinion too!
 
Lol! I did think at the time it would have been nice to have someone to shoo them away. I was just glad they didn't take flight just as we were landing, now that could have been interesting!! :-D
 
A couple of years back we were last to go dressage at the August event, as we finished, people, I guess you could call them duck controllers, emerged from the woods followed by the largest flock of ducks I have ever seen! They were all over the dressage arenas in minutes, fortunately B was quite a sensible chaps and just decided that it was best to pretend they were not there while walking away really really quickly :)
 
Im not complaining that it was RC fault just that when they are blocking the track and taking up your time its not fair is it?? If the entire section had to pass through them then fair enough and when you are held there is plenty of evidence to back you are such as the DVD company footage plus the Fence judge times for fence before and after incident which can work out time held ect.
We all had Fab time!! had 1 int and 1 open which was great fun. we are all hoping to be back next yr for 3rd yr always have great time doing the long format which provides great experience for the young horses.
Well done to BRC any issues that arrose were soon dealt with..
 
Reading through the above comments I would just like to give you the facts. I am very grateful for Zebedee's kind comments but would just like to clarify that BRC hire the site from us and are responsible for their own ground preparation. Not the Aston-le-Walls team! The CIC** track was slit and watered by us at BRC's request and cost. If competitors feel that they would like further ground preparation for next year's Championships, then please use your time to contact BRC and these forums in a constructive fashion - ground preparation doesn't just happen! It is likely that this may result in an additional levy/start fee. To have prepared all 4 tracks perfectly.You would have to start by watering daily for a week with 5 days aerovating (which would have required hire of 2 tractor/bowsers, a tractor/aerovater, wages for the drivers and fuel) all of which would have come to approximately four thousand pounds. I am sure BRC were trying to keep costs down for competitors, so if you would like to pay more for better ground then they need to know!Considering the logistics of what BRC put on for approximately 400 competitors plus running a European Championship they did an exceptional job running ALL the different divisions for all the competitors at many different levels.

For our forthcoming BE event we have already started ground preparation, which will be to our usual standard and includes slitting, aerovating, watering and putting down sand and woodchippings where required (at considerable cost!) This is as per our May and July BE horse trials which received exceedingly good feedback on the ground conditions. In July we spent an additional day aerovating, in order to ensure good preparation of the dressage arenas,dressage warm up, show jumping arena and warm up and XC warm up

We would be very grateful (and I don't know if it is possible) if someone could change the heading of this thread as ALW was not responsible for the ground conditions at the BRC championships; good or bad.

ps If the ground was so unacceptably hard, I am particularly surprised at the high percentage of runners who accrued time faults for running too fast!
 
I cannot quote on phone, but very much agree with nigel tailors last sentence.

Nigel- to change title it might be advisable to message admin on here- the fat controller is the username to search for.
 
Yes totally agree with above, even those in Open were getting plenty of too fast TF some 20+ sec under OT!!! Personally cant see how that was necessary for the horses when everyone had stop watches on..
Well done to Nigel for his great work and Brill Xc course walk!!
 
Many thanks for taking the time to reply Nigel - your viewpoint is much appreciated and confirms as I suspected that the preparation of the ground was the responsibility of BRC not ALW.

As many have pointed out, ALW has a good reputation (hence why I was disappointed not to find better conditions) and its a shame that reputation has been undermined by BRC's desire to minimise costs.

I personally would be more than happy to pay more for BRC membership/entry fees in order to ensure better going - I own just one horse and he is very precious to me!

Unfortunately I don't believe it is possible for me to edit the title of my thread - however I will contact the Fat Controller and ask for it to be removed.

I complained to the BRC organisers on the day and will do so again in writing.
 
Nigel Taylor said:
Reading through the above comments I would just like to give you the facts. I am very grateful for Zebedee's kind comments but would just like to clarify that BRC hire the site from us and are responsible for their own ground preparation. Not the Aston-le-Walls team!

ps If the ground was so unacceptably hard, I am particularly surprised at the high percentage of runners who accrued time faults for running too fast!
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Sorry for the error Nigel -The commentary team in XC control were full of praise for the ground preparations on the XC course all weekend, & attributed that entirely to yourself & Ann, along with your team at ALW & I assumed that they would have had the correct background information.

My riders certainly had no complaints, & reading through the other replies on here I think eventingdraft is in a very small minority in feeling that the conditions were unacceptable on the national tracks.
 
Nigel Taylor said:
Reading through the above comments I would just like to give you the facts. I am very grateful for Zebedee's kind comments but would just like to clarify that BRC hire the site from us and are responsible for their own ground preparation. Not the Aston-le-Walls team! The CIC** track was slit and watered by us at BRC's request and cost. If competitors feel that they would like further ground preparation for next year's Championships, then please use your time to contact BRC and these forums in a constructive fashion - ground preparation doesn't just happen! It is likely that this may result in an additional levy/start fee. To have prepared all 4 tracks perfectly.You would have to start by watering daily for a week with 5 days aerovating (which would have required hire of 2 tractor/bowsers, a tractor/aerovater, wages for the drivers and fuel) all of which would have come to approximately four thousand pounds. I am sure BRC were trying to keep costs down for competitors, so if you would like to pay more for better ground then they need to know!Considering the logistics of what BRC put on for approximately 400 competitors plus running a European Championship they did an exceptional job running ALL the different divisions for all the competitors at many different levels.

For our forthcoming BE event we have already started ground preparation, which will be to our usual standard and includes slitting, aerovating, watering and putting down sand and woodchippings where required (at considerable cost!) This is as per our May and July BE horse trials which received exceedingly good feedback on the ground conditions. In July we spent an additional day aerovating, in order to ensure good preparation of the dressage arenas,dressage warm up, show jumping arena and warm up and XC warm up

We would be very grateful (and I don't know if it is possible) if someone could change the heading of this thread as ALW was not responsible for the ground conditions at the BRC championships; good or bad.

ps If the ground was so unacceptably hard, I am particularly surprised at the high percentage of runners who accrued time faults for running too fast!
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Nigel - I thought the ground for the non CIC classes was perfectly OK - my two ran in the Intermediate and neither rider had any complaints at all. Never been to the ALW and thought "not running" on that ground - some events I wouldn't even go to! THANK YOU VERY MUCH INDEED FOR ALL YOUR WORK.
 
Just wanted to add, that in every ALW event I have been to over the last few years (both BE and their own unaff series - not BRC run events) the ground conditions have been very impressive and HUGELY APPRECIATED. I echo supagran - huge thanks to Nigel and the ALW team for such a lot of prep work.
 
Well said Nigel.

I was happy with the ground, and think that organizers work their backsides off to prepare for events for riders, and sadly you can never please everybody.

I didn't complete unfortunately. My horse panicked in phase C at the steeplechase horses and I came off - broke thumb, black eye, bruised shoulders, possible fractured sternum. :(

thankfully, my horse was fine, the ground did not affect him, his legs were perfect when they caught him and the next day he managed the 7hour journey home without a problem and is a happy hoss in his field today.

Personally I felt the ground hurt but then I did come off in full gallop at a corner!

If I lived closer I would definitely be a regular at ALW. Hopefully I can have a go at qualifying next year :D
 
ArcticFox said:
Well said Nigel.

I was happy with the ground, and think that organizers work their backsides off to prepare for events for riders, and sadly you can never please everybody.

I didn't complete unfortunately. My horse panicked in phase C at the steeplechase horses and I came off - broke thumb, black eye, bruised shoulders, possible fractured sternum. :(

thankfully, my horse was fine, the ground did not affect him, his legs were perfect when they caught him and the next day he managed the 7hour journey home without a problem and is a happy hoss in his field today.

Personally I felt the ground hurt but then I did come off in full gallop at a corner!

If I lived closer I would definitely be a regular at ALW. Hopefully I can have a go at qualifying next year :D
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Hi ArcticFox. I was going to ask on here if anyone knew the grey horse who was loose on Phase C to make sure you were OK! We caught your horse and took his saddle off and put it back on again as it had slipped right round and was nearly under his tummy. He was galloping around the steeplechase in a panic and luckily he came to a stop right near me (I also had a bucket which helped!) He was covered in clay because he'd slipped down the riverbank in his panic but did stay on his feet and thankfuly I think that shocked him enough for him to stop so we grabbed him. He was such a gent when he was caught, so glad youre both OK.
 
Thank you, are you the lady who was still holding him when I was in the car with the doctor? you had given him polo mints (he loves those!)

Thank you very much for catching him, he is a lovely horse and is usually frightened of people so I am glad he let you catch him. I was very worried that he might have hurt himself but was reassured when I saw he had been caught and the saddle straightened - I pulled the saddle off with my foot when I fell. I can't believe he didn't fall himself as we took the 90degree corner at full gallop.

We brought him home on Monday and he is now relaxing in the field - no injuries so for me that is the main thing :)

There was also a man who ran to my aid at the time, I don't know who he is but he had a red lorry parked near the stables. He was a great help and must have been knackered after running to my aid!

Can't really believe it happened on phase C, don't think I will live it down!!!
 
No, we caught him, did his saddle and checked him over to make sure he was OK. We then walked him back to the steeplchase steward because we had to get to the 10 min box to help our friend (we were there with the blue and white cob, about 2 after you I think so it may even have been him your horse was frightened by). We ran over to close the gate into the steeplechase field when we saw him coming and he came flying over, we thought he was going to jump it! That's when he went down the bank into all the clay and that slowed him right down. he scrambled back up the bank and stood still, in shock I think. He was very relieved to be caught and have people to look after him! Such a well behaved by to handle.

Glad you're both OK.
 
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