Those of you without arenas....

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smirnoff_ice

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...do you compete? How do you manage in the winter? We've never had anywhere to school in the winter, but have always coped. However, this year i feel that my horses have so much potential and not having an arena is stopping us. I want to get out & do more with them, but the fields are the only places to ride and they're like ice rinks!
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I love our yard (only got 11 stables, so it's nice & quiet, with no bitching), but not having an arena really lets it down. We pay £28 per week for stable, fab grazing (as much as we want, no matter what), as much straw as we want and ad lib hay. Oh, and £4 p/w for the trailer. Hacking is brill too.

We went to look at a new yard yesterday (currently under construction) and OMG it's amazing! We just went to have a nose around, but now i want to move!! It's got 100acres of grazing, huge indoor arena, huge outdoor arena, horse walker, brand new American Barn stables, all-weather gallops under construction, etc. Only 20 stables, so not too big.

Downside is the hacking - there's hardly anything nearby. Could hack around the gallops, but i dont know how long it would take for the novelty of that to wear off! Stables are 12ft X 12ft, which is smaller than our current 14ft X 14ft, but we can live with that!

What's more important to you - hacking or schooling?

It's £40 p/w DIY, which includes ad lib haylage. More expensive than the yard we're at now, and we'd have to buy bedding, but the facilites are amazing!

Would you stay or move??

Mum is saying it's expensive (she'd be paying livery for one of them while my sister goes travelling for a year).

Wish i hadnt gone to look at it now! I'm all confused!
 
I have an arena, I compete all year and I must say I don't use it an awful lot, hardly ever in winter time, as it's bleak and windy up here!
I ride for a yard about 10minutes from me, one of the owners competes upto novice level BE and schools once a month, so I must say after watchinbg her successes its certainly possible to compete and win without regular schooling. To me the hacking is much more important than the schooling facilities, yes, its nice to practice some flatwork and jumping but my horses are much happier being have a good old hack, and hacking up here is second to none
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Yards with lots of facilities seem great, but find out how available the facilities realy are. For example, you might find that they are rented out for competitions etc some of the time and very busy at the popular times.

I have a friend who is at a yard with massive indoor arenas, gallops, xc courses etc. However, if there are lessons, bookings etc, they don't get to use them whenever they want. Also, there are 40 horses there so finding a slot to use a school is hard.

It might work out cheaper for you to box up and go to somewhere with good hacking, or hire an indoor school a few times a week. If you share the hassle and costs with a friend it will be easier.
 
There was a post in competition riders about this recently. Several forum members have competed at advanced eventing without an arena. Its a struggle but it just makes you more determined. For me I do not have an arena compete at novice level eventing but the fact my horse has over 100 acres of all year round turnout and free livery compensates for this. As I see it there are only 4 months where I cannot ride in the field.
 
My girlies are deffinately happy hackers, and we still do well at local shows, but lately i've wanted to do more. I want to be out every weekend and i'd love to affiliate.
At the moment, they're both only rideable in walk (both coming back from injury - aren't I the lucky one!!), so we cant do much anyway and until they can at least trot, it's not worth hiring anywhere. Have started schooling out on hacks again, just getting them in an outline and they're going really nicely, but i just dont have the same frame of mind on a hack as i do in a school!
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We spoke to the new YO about how busy the arenas are. They have 7 horses themselves, 6 current liveries and 14 stables under construction. At the moment, it's only her daughter who rides regularly, but it all depends on what sort of people move on. She said she's prefer to have people with multiple horses, rather than 14 people with a horse each, so that would be better.
 
Can i have some of your determination please?!! We've got 300 acres of land where we are now, but it's arable so we cant ride on it until it's harvested.
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And when it IS harvested, we HAVE to gallop!!
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Can ride around the edges of the crops, in the horses fields and in the turkey fields all year, but they're just so slippy!

Oh, and also our horses are sissies! When it's raining, they stick their noses into their chests, bend away from the rain and refuse to go forwards!
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An indoor arena would solve this problem!
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I'm like you Lec, plenty of fields and it is only a couple of months of the year they are out of bounds.
I find that, especially with my coloured, and often with the Bay, Wills, the boys get used to the arena and just don't work as well, my coloured is terrible to jump in there, and Wills who can whack up a pretty impressive dressage score will just not use himself in my arena, just because they go in there all the time.
 
I think it comes down to how competitive you are and your horses. For a young horse I think being at a yard with decent facilities really helps. I have a five year old ISH and I get alot more out of him hacking and on the gallops then I do in the school and so it works better for me to work with him out and then school maybe once or twice. However I wouldn't cope without the arena, not having to worry about the weather, slipping, to hard, not enclosed enough etc etc. The arena at this yard (More of a pleasure riders yard) is woodchip and deep, uneven woodchip at that so I'll soon be wanting a better suface, bigger arena and more jumps....I had a trainer who didn't have an arena and did very well with hers affilated showing and dressage.
 
I agree. I'd swap my arena for really good hacking any day. Yep i like the arena and use it a lot and my horse benefits from it because she has back problems but before I had the arena I still competed but I hired an arena once a week instead. It very much depends on whether your horses can cope on grass.
 
I've gone from being on a DIY with no arena to livery with an indoor and outdoor.
I loved my last yard but couldn't put up with the lack of arena any longer, when I was there I used to box once a fortnight to a riding club clinic (indoors) on a tuesday evening and then on alternate weeks would have a dressage lesson on the weekend.
I would hack out at 7am as it was the only time I could ride in some form of daylight.
I managed, but it wasn't fun. It is so much easier with an arena.
Personally I would move.
 
Depends what you want to do competing wise really! I do a fair amount of schooling my horse whilst hacking out...and that is on roads as we have no off road stuff near us. But we don't do dressage tests or anything like that, I just like my horse to be well behaved and reasonably responsive. I would go for hacking over a school any day of the week!
 
Glad nobody here has smugly admitted to having both!
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We've got an arena which I think we'd die without. Hacking's cr*p but we are near the beach and there's good parking there.

Occasionally we go round next-doors fields, but mostly we paddock-bash and gaze longingly at the land surrounding us!
 
I never had an arena til about 10 days ago. I used to school on the field as much as poss with the help of a site light. It's dark by the time I get home, so I can only hack at the weekends. Before I got the school, in winter I used to box to an indoor school once or twice a week & also try to compete mid week as then you're kind of getting 'free' use of the school, & book lessons in the week too.

I bd'd & bsja'd off 'schooling' (ie slithering about...) on grass & hacking at weekends. The 'schooling' involved a lot of walk work sometimes if the ground was bad, so my main issue was fitness.

Our hacking's not tremendous, so we box to the next village now & then for better offroad hacking.

I'd prefer to have schooling facilities over hacking cos I want to school more than I want to hack, & if we've got to mess about boxing somewhere to hack, it's easier to do it at weekends.
 
I'm on a fairly large yard (40ish horses) with an indoor & outdoor arena. We can use the arenas any time they aren't booked for lessons & it's rare that both are booked at the same time. The hacking isn't fantastic but it's o.k for what I do. I wouldn't cope without the arenas as I'd be too lazy to ride if it was wet, cold, etc.

I think I'd always opt for facilities over hacking but I suppose it depends how much you hack. Also through the winter it's dark by the time I get home so I only hack once a week.
 
I compete (BSJA / BE etc.) and just have a field. I also feel I could be so much better if we had an arena but there's not much I can do about that! However, mine are kept at home. If I were paying for livery then one of my main requirements would definately be an arena! 12ft x 12ft aren't big stables... I hope your horse is small?!

To me schooling is definately more important because I very very rarely hack so that doesnt bother me!

TBH I would move yards if I were you, but only if you can afford the cost?
 
I know how you feel, i could get so uch schooling done if i had an arena!!I only have wet muddy fields at the mo. I also never have a place to lunge in the winter which is annoying. It would be so nice to have an indoor areana!!but.....i cant move because the place im at is very cheap and only a five min cycle ride. It is just an annoying fact that some of us just dont get the chance to have it all
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i will when im older
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I still copete, but to be honest its only at PC level, and my dressage is always awful because i cant practice!!If i was you i would move, but that is because i would probably prefer being able to school and jump, and if i had talented horses that would influence me even more
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Well, in the winter I can only hack out at weekends as work 9-5 during the week, have no arena and field is hilly and of course wet. We have a lot of hackingand country lanes around us but i am not insane enough to ride in the dark no matter how much reflective gear I had, I value my life!

I have always BSJA'd and cross countried and done ODEs at various level (nothing huge mind) and they've always coped through the winter as all SJ is inside and there's hardly any on anyway. If i get the chance I'll go with sister or friend and hire a school but to be honest I just do 'tick over' work with mine in winter - a bit of 'reminding' about how to work when out hacking but not much more than that. Ideally would love to put in a school mainly so could then school them in the winter after work but, unless I have a windfall sometime soon i can't see if happening!

The wagon's broken at the moment anyway so cant go anywhere! (what happened to that lottery win i was sure was due to come my way.....?)
 
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