Sunburn and two falls; My ODE diary.

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reindeerlover

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There was a RC event yesterday and although I had wanted to do it, I hadn't put my name down as it was a team event and I was a bit late. Anyway, I had an email last Sunday to say that a space was available as an individual and did I want it. I replied that I did and went to choose my horse- Orange one who is excellent but not sound in a circle in trot or big boy who was off all last week and I have never jumped over 2 foot.

Orange boy decided he was too lame even with bute so concentrated on new boy, did some trotting in circles in the week (or "dressage") and he was going quite nicely so despite the still swollen forearm I decided to take him (not lame!). As he's an ex chaser/pointer I didn't think he would have a problem xc (also, nice new sharer had jumped him a coupe of weeks ago) and as he was generally calm about coloured poles I assumed no problems there either so concentrated on the trotting in circles, sorry- Dressage.

Friday evening I got on in the round pen for more "dressage" and neglected to put right foot in stirrup straight away, cue horse leaping forward as my leg flailed wildly and I pulled the poor thing in the teeth. Ended up with me falling off on top of the fence and removing much of the skin from my back (ironically, had just been loaned a body protector and placed it safely in my car).

I manned up and got back on and he was great so Saturday morning plaited up and travelled to Snowball farm. Wandered around XC course with very experienced people speaking about striding and which side has a better landing etc. Went white, stuttered a lot and had life flash before my eyes. HUGE jumps, meant to be maximum of 90cm high but sadly also about 90cm wide with stupid flowers, drops, ditches etc. Crikey, I wanted to give up then but thought I'd get the dressarge out of the way first.

Dressage went ok, managed about 7 minutes warm up and although our transitions to walk were always managed with nose poking we did ok I thought. However, I saw photos last night and I looked dreadful so I'm not really looking forward to seeing the score sheet. My position needs work, by "work" I mean "completely changing".

Show jumping next, jumped well in the warm up although area was very small with lots of people in it so I declined to jump the spread fence. Entered arena, calm but alert (horse, not me) cantered to first, jumped large ;

www.elainebarbourphotography.com > Horse Events Gallery > HWRC Horse Trials Snowball Farm May 22nd > Show Jumping > Novice Classes > HWRC_Trials_1048.jpg

Jumped second equally large and we just didn't have room to jump 3 so had to circle and try again. Jumped extra large. Jumped 4 extra extra large (next picture in series) and I lost my stirrups when he stopped at 5. Did a circuit of arena sans stirrups (remember the leg flailing/panic situation form earlier?) got stirrups back. Tried again, dirty stop, lost stirrups, fell off. Winded but not too sore, managed to miss skinless back in fall and land instead on heavily padded arse.

Laughed it off, declined paramedics, swore to glue stirrups to feet in future and left arena eliminated (the shame! thank goodness they got my name wrong). Was a bit nervous about attempting xc then due to the 85 cm showjumps being so massively overjumped but thought I'd go and do the warm up and see how it went. Worried and just about managed to do the practice jump after about 15 minutes of wimping out. He jumped sooo beautifully though that I decided to give it a go and we went off smiling. OH. MY.GOD. He jumped like a winged horse, just flew over them and I was beaming after every fence, he jumped the logs;

www.elainebarbourphotography.com Horse Events Gallery > HWRC Horse Trials Snowball Farm May 22nd > X Country > HWRC_Trials_549.jpg

The weird scary water tower thing with flowers, the upright wide trough thingy, the huge roll top, the wide cottage thingy, the scary green plastic barrel off-set double, then got a little close to the spread of tires (actually he didn't really but I just expected him to take a long stride) and I decided that I knew best and threw myself forward (like the polo guy in the video) did a "superman pose" lost those darn stirrups and landed heavily- causing slight panic and "zoom" mode. Decided I had no chance of getting said stirrups back before steeplechase hedge with drop and bailed out. On my head.

Paramedics called, got the day wrong (as I always ride on Sunday) hesitated about my name (because I had been explaining to everyone all day that no, I wasn't the original rider) and so they insisted on doing a full exam on me, by which time my time allowed had run out and I was not allowed to continue!

Gutted, he actually went soooo well and I would have loved to continue but I was so pleased with him, apart from the showjumping phase which obviously needs work it was only me who let him down and he was so genuine and so calm and tried so hard. It is clear that I need to (1) Ride my horse over some jumps before I take him eventing, (2) Learn to keep my stirrups, (3) Lose the "forward seat" and sort out my abysmal riding. :D

I love that horse, despite falling off 3 times in 2 days. If you have read all this a nice glass of cold pimms and maybe some biscuits? :)
 
Nice posting, good you know your own faults so you can learn from them, and practice getting things right:);)

I need to work on my arms/elbows sticking out like chicken wings when jumping :D
 
Good on you for keeping at it....all in all sounds like a pretty painful experience but your obviously a confident rider and know what you need to do next....

Pedantic - I also have the chicken wings thing going on :o :D
 
Glad you had a good outing, even with the falls :)

I defnitely need to work on my legs! Stirrups too short, have to ride longer, legs arent quiet... The list goes on!

x
 
Hmm...chicken wings....... I don't THINK I do that but then I don't often see pictures of myself jumping. I'm gutted I can't put up direct links on here because the pictures are beautiful. I went to RC camp last year and had "head up" beaten into me so that magically taught me to keep my heels down and feet in stirrups. Sadly old habits die hard and I haven't jumped much recently as have just had youngsters so I forgot :(

He seems well today though, relieved that I gave him the day off and only patted him as I fed him instead of plaiting and making him do unnatural things! Poor old chap.

Who's up for a strawberry daquiri?
 
I am so pleased that I am not alone in being foolish enough to not practice the 'horse off the ground over an obstacle' thing BEFORE the show :D First year with the current Appy, entered the riding club horse class (we are nowhere near the eventing stuff!) and realised about 5 minutes before the class that there was a jump involved! Had never jumped the mare in cold blood at that point (only when out hacking and she jumped a stream and some 'funny' coloured tarmac) The practice fence was down so only walked her through the wings. In the class decided to get the jump out of the way first (this was not a good idea). She jumped hugely, then I lost all stopping ability and found that the only way to slow her down was to aim for the line up! We did not do well in that class :D
You are much braver than I am, good luck with the next outing :)
 
yorksG said:
I am so pleased that I am not alone in being foolish enough to not practice the 'horse off the ground over an obstacle' thing BEFORE the show :D First year with the current Appy, entered the riding club horse class (we are nowhere near the eventing stuff!) and realised about 5 minutes before the class that there was a jump involved! Had never jumped the mare in cold blood at that point (only when out hacking and she jumped a stream and some 'funny' coloured tarmac) The practice fence was down so only walked her through the wings. In the class decided to get the jump out of the way first (this was not a good idea). She jumped hugely, then I lost all stopping ability and found that the only way to slow her down was to aim for the line up! We did not do well in that class :D
You are much braver than I am, good luck with the next outing :)
Click to expand...

:D Hahahaa, brilliant- that's the kind of thing I'd do, crack on and hope for the best!

I like the chicken wings clique idea, can we join if we just like chicken or do we have to have a fowl-related jumping problem? I fly through the air rather like a chicken, will that do?
 
Loved this post, hilarious - I was at Snowball on Saturday as well and thought the xc was massive! Felt loads bigger than an Intro BE - the hedge after your 'mishap' my horse stumbled and nearly fell on landing as the drop was really hefty! My mother and a friend overheard me 'blaspheming' loudly and had to pretend not to know me...
 
Hurrah a fellow RCer! I'm not sure I've jumped that big in 11 years since I did an open hunter trials in Ireland on the Orange boy, seriously huge jumps- am impressed that you got round, big round of applause! I was told by experienced people while walking the course to stay to the right as the drop wasn't as steep but frankly I doubt I would have remembered as I was running on the "point and shoot" experience. Scary stuff.
 
Lol farrierlover, you've had a very eventful few days! That gave me a good giggle anyway. Hope your back is ok though, it does sound sore. And big pats to the lad for giving it as good a go as he could from the sounds of it. Big pats to you for laughing it off too. I'd have been a crying shivering mess i think. Lovely photos too!

Oh, and i would probably have worse chicken wings than you lot put together :o :p Here's the photographic evidence (Osc isn't actually jumping, i'm carrying us both over it in chicken flapping style):
jump17.jpg

So can i be in the Clique too? :D

Although i vote that flying through the air like a chicken counts too for farrierlover :p
 
Ooh, very chickeny somethingorother! I love that your orange horse with lots of white is called Oscar- mine too. My back is still unbelievably sore, I covered it up yesterday as I kept getting my clothes stuck to it :p but must go to chemist today for some form of proper drugs to bathe in. The big lad was such a star he really tried as hard as he could to carry on and ignore the strange squawking chickeny creature sat on him. :D
 
Farrierlover, At least you had a go!
I have a feeling you were competing for the riding club I'm in, and we find it really hard to get members for teams - everyone seems to think that they are not good enough!
we're looking for dressage riders for the Area Team event on 6th June if you fancy having another go!
 
ooo do hope that your not too sore and suffering today but forgive me as I do not normally post negative comments.

However I did not find the post funny or witty just uncomfortable to read. We all know how dangerous horse riding really is and that even with the correct preparation things can go horribly wrong. To compete when by your own admittance you were so unprepared makes me feel uncomfortable and the two falls really shows how dangerous it could have been. Your falls could have been so much worse and resulted in injuries to your poor horse. Anyway like i said sorry for the negative comments im glad that both you and the horse are ok.
 
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