windsor driving trials - some photos :)

Toffee_monster

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Today i backstpped for the first time, it was day one at Windsor driving trials and the lady i helped out was doing a national qualifier !!!

I had a fab time and learnt so much, cant wait to get my own pony to some trials now !!!

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How wonderful. I recently had a carriage driving lesson and was suprised by just how much fun it was! I was expecting it to be rather sedate (totally inexperienced when it comes to carriage driving!) but boy was I wrong! It was such good fun :)
 
Great photos, nice to see Lyndsay getting on well with her new pony (the grey) - I'm so used to her old boy that I can't get used to it! Who were you backstepping?
 
I was back stepping for Jackie Durkin and had a great day. I drive nearly every day but never backstepped outdoors so a great learning curve for me. Just wish I could have done tomorrows marathon :(
 
Lovely photos. I groomed for a day for the lady with the buckskin pony, had a great time. As for expense, daughtersgroom, look at the Indoor Horse Driving Trials website, that's a far more affordable way of competing.
 
Marathons will come in time, but if you have never backstepped outdoors before then starting at a national isn't ideal - they can be really quite a challenge and a lot to remember and think about! See if you can find someone steady to do a few local events with smaller obstacles first, maybe some indoors over the winter with people who have steady turnouts so you can find your balance, and spend as much time as you can watching backsteppers of all drivers - not all backsteppers at a high level are as good as they could be, so see what you can learn. Think about the mechanics of keeping the carriage upright, where your weight might need to be in different situations, be as fit as you can so you are nimble and can swap sides very quickly, learn as much as you can about driving itself so you can see situations developing as quickly or faster than the driver, and you will be a really valuable backstepper soon enough :-) It is seriously addictive though, but is an amazing feeling to get your turnout round a national marathon successfully, and is a far more important part in the whole thing than people give you credit for :-) :-) :-)
 
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