Simple Show for Traditional Cob

[fishy]

Can anybody help us with a simple but effective ridden show for my daughters little traditional cob. She has just started to show him in ridden classes and they are both fairly novice. We would like some advice as to what to do to show him off to the judge. We are only doing a few local riding club shows but need to be prepared in case they don't advise her what to do. Thanks x

 

[Natch]

She needs to show off all his paces, walk trot and canter. Possibly gallop too, but that depends on the show really.

The basic show is to walk forward out of the line up and stand square for the judge to have a good look. When the judge or the steward waves her on, she needs to walk away in a straight line, turn nicely, and walk for a few steps, then trot towards and past the judge in a straight line. Then its easiest to take a figure of 8/ two 20m circles in front of the line up, trotting on both reins, and a bit of canter. A few strides of gallop along the long edge if it is required (I would ask the judge if not sure, or see what others do). If he does nice lateral work, extended or collected or so on then a few strides of that. Keep it short and sweet, and if he's terrible on one rein or one pace do less of that in a place the judge perhaps can't see too well Likewise if canter on a circle is going to be unbalanced, then canter along the side before joining the figure of 8 again. Come back to the judge, halt square, and smile (Salute possibly? Someone else might be able to confirm that its been a while since I showed!).

If I were her I would work out a basic routine at home, but take a look at the layout of the ring when she's in there - if its on grass it might be a bit poached in places, and is bound to have a slope to it - work that to your advantage.

The other thing is she can subtly gauge what place she would like to enter the ring in. First if the horse is better without others in front and confident enough, middle if you want to see what others do before you get to your show (some judges will pull you in the first time in the same order you entered, others will put you in an initial placed order), or last if you need to keep some space from others and he's not good with horses behind him. Keep some space, its okay to circle away or overtake on a corner if you need to do that to keep some space/avoid a problem with the horse in front, but do try to do it not directly in front of the judge as this will obstruct their view and won't earn you brownie points. If you need to smack him to wake him up again do it behind the judge but remember they can hear and are ingeniously good at working out who it was

Best of luck, and remember, its supposed to be enjoyable

 

[fishy]

Thank you for replying. We now have something to work on. My daughter took him to his first ridden show last weekend at our local riding school. It was a very small affair and great to see how he behaved. He was an angel and was happy with the other horses and stood quietly in the line up but he was quite strong and cantered on the wrong leg a couple of times (although she recognised this and corrected it). Fortunately the judge had a show that she wanted them to do but it brought home the fact that we hadn't prepared anything and she would have had to make something up very quickly if the judge hadn't. I'm pleased to say however he got a 1st and 2nd. So fingers crossed for the next one. Oh and she's got the showing bug!!!