HufflyPuffly
Well-Known Member
Hi I know that this is very small fry compared to a lot on here but I'm just bursting with pride and friends and family are now officially bored of the 'I Love our Pony' gushing 
.
Sorry this may be long
Now from the few posts I've done on here I've said I get to ride my mum's lovely horse Topaz as my competition horse (SJ and eventing is the aim). We've had her about 3 years now and she has been seriously tricky. She would get way too over the top at comps and is very spooky! Coupled with her complete lack of basic schooling when we got her meant it's been a long hard slog to get her soft and relaxed even at home never mind out.
Our only forays into dressage has been in the first phase at the ODE's we've entered, and was just a matter of not getting eliminated. We would get comments such as 'exploded into canter', 'cantering when should be trotting', 'cantering when should be walking', 'piaffing when should be halted', 'left the arena', 'misbehaving' you get the idea... we even had some lovely flying changes on a twenty meter circle that for some reason were not required at unaffiliated 75cm level .
So anyway excuse my waffling, I just wanted to give you an idea that flatwork is NOT Topaz's strong point. We've been working really hard over winter and I felt we have made some small steps forward and as we have an ODE next week I entered an unaffiliated dressage at a lovely venue we've been to before, but only ever jumping. Cue stomach churning dread, I have no idea what possessed me to ask if they would take me as a late entry into the Into B and Prelim 4 classes, but they did!!
So off I toddle, we warmed up in the field away from the other horses to try and keep her concentration and she's feeling lovely...decided on account of all the cantering she likes to add we would only warm up in walk and trot for the Intro, kept her attention with lots of transitions, some flexion and baby leg yields and she stayed mostly soft and relaxed. I could barely breathe waiting for the giraffe 'alert pose' to make an appearance but she went better than I could have hoped!!! Went into the official warm up area next to the dressage area and cue a little snorting and pouncing about but she settled back down and went like this in the test, (for all the button pushers all pics were taken by my dad who is not and has never been a professional photographer thank you):
Yes she still was a little inconsistent in her head carriage and you can see a sneaky mouth opening evasion, but we did all the movements at all the right points with no added cantering!!!
So I popped her back to the box for 10 mins for a rest and lots of pats and then got back on for the prelim. Now came the difficult bit how to add the canter in without any hysterics
We did have a bit of this in the warm up:
Lol cantering is just so much fun and requires lift! Not helped when someone turned some horses out who were hoolying around. So we retired back to the official warm which Topaz was a bit concerned was scary and enclosed but she was actually very good. On the way to the proper warm up area my mum went to find out if the tests were out, we thought with 12 in the class that there wouldnt be a hope of her being placed this is Topaz after all . but she only went and WON with a massive 76.09%!!!! I just still cant believe it I know its only an Intro test, but from where we have come from to now its just unbelievable!!!!
Now very tempted to just go home never compete again and finish on a high, realised that I was actually next in and should get on with settling her back down again.
Did another lovely lovely sweet test, some of our canter transitions were a little wobbly and it definitely wasnt as smooth as the first test but I was just thrilled.
Decided to wait for the results so I could get my sheet and look at what to improve on, and saw some really lovely horses go well. We decided that we really wouldnt be placed this time as our canter def needs work doing, but you guessed it we only won again!!!! Thought maybe theyd at this point got me confused with another combination, there was just no chance that me and Topaz could win not one but two proper dressage tests!! We had though and with a very credible 67.73%. Over the moon and dont think I will stop smiling for a week! think the lovely people at the venue think Im crazy as I did well up when they said Id won the Prelim
Onwards and upwards, cant wait for our ODE now fingers crossed Topaz continues her calm streak.
Thanks for reading x x x
PS sorry if the pics are huge photobucket is having a major meltdown on me!
. Sorry this may be long
Now from the few posts I've done on here I've said I get to ride my mum's lovely horse Topaz as my competition horse (SJ and eventing is the aim). We've had her about 3 years now and she has been seriously tricky. She would get way too over the top at comps and is very spooky! Coupled with her complete lack of basic schooling when we got her meant it's been a long hard slog to get her soft and relaxed even at home never mind out
.Our only forays into dressage has been in the first phase at the ODE's we've entered, and was just a matter of not getting eliminated
. We would get comments such as 'exploded into canter', 'cantering when should be trotting', 'cantering when should be walking', 'piaffing when should be halted', 'left the arena', 'misbehaving' you get the idea... we even had some lovely flying changes on a twenty meter circle that for some reason were not required at unaffiliated 75cm level .So anyway excuse my waffling, I just wanted to give you an idea that flatwork is NOT Topaz's strong point. We've been working really hard over winter and I felt we have made some small steps forward and as we have an ODE next week I entered an unaffiliated dressage at a lovely venue we've been to before, but only ever jumping. Cue stomach churning dread, I have no idea what possessed me to ask if they would take me as a late entry into the Into B and Prelim 4 classes, but they did!!
So off I toddle, we warmed up in the field away from the other horses to try and keep her concentration and she's feeling lovely...decided on account of all the cantering she likes to add we would only warm up in walk and trot for the Intro, kept her attention with lots of transitions, some flexion and baby leg yields and she stayed mostly soft and relaxed. I could barely breathe waiting for the giraffe 'alert pose' to make an appearance but she went better than I could have hoped!!! Went into the official warm up area next to the dressage area and cue a little snorting and pouncing about but she settled back down and went like this in the test, (for all the button pushers all pics were taken by my dad who is not and has never been a professional photographer thank you):
Yes she still was a little inconsistent in her head carriage and you can see a sneaky mouth opening evasion, but we did all the movements at all the right points with no added cantering!!!
So I popped her back to the box for 10 mins for a rest and lots of pats and then got back on for the prelim. Now came the difficult bit how to add the canter in without any hysterics
We did have a bit of this in the warm up:
Lol cantering is just so much fun and requires lift! Not helped when someone turned some horses out who were hoolying around. So we retired back to the official warm which Topaz was a bit concerned was scary and enclosed but she was actually very good. On the way to the proper warm up area my mum went to find out if the tests were out, we thought with 12 in the class that there wouldnt be a hope of her being placed this is Topaz after all . but she only went and WON with a massive 76.09%!!!! I just still cant believe it I know its only an Intro test, but from where we have come from to now its just unbelievable!!!!
Now very tempted to just go home never compete again and finish on a high, realised that I was actually next in and should get on with settling her back down again.
Did another lovely lovely sweet test, some of our canter transitions were a little wobbly and it definitely wasnt as smooth as the first test but I was just thrilled.
Decided to wait for the results so I could get my sheet and look at what to improve on, and saw some really lovely horses go well. We decided that we really wouldnt be placed this time as our canter def needs work doing, but you guessed it we only won again!!!! Thought maybe theyd at this point got me confused with another combination, there was just no chance that me and Topaz could win not one but two proper dressage tests!! We had though and with a very credible 67.73%. Over the moon and dont think I will stop smiling for a week! think the lovely people at the venue think Im crazy as I did well up when they said Id won the Prelim
Onwards and upwards, cant wait for our ODE now fingers crossed Topaz continues her calm streak.
Thanks for reading x x x
PS sorry if the pics are huge photobucket is having a major meltdown on me!
