HufflyPuffly
Well-Known Member
Not done a comp report for the black beast for a fair while now! In fact it was last Nov that we were last out and as she was a bit silly I gave her a couple of months to go and do some other fun, no pressure things 
.
So I figured we should probably dip our toes back in to the dressage world and see if Topaz remembered how to dressage
. Made a trip out to run through the regional test to Bold Heath last Sunday, and it was blooming chilly!
Arrived and Topaz decided to act like she had never left our yard and certainly had never graced an indoor before
. Her behaviour included and wasn't limited to, spooking at the mounting block (it was yellow ) loudly (snorting) and so dramatically other riders had to give us plenty of space , spooking at the viewing gallery, spooking at the passageway of doom, spooking at the banner next to the passageway of doom, spooking at the nice lady poo picking the warm-up , spooking at the open end of the arena, needing to be led like a lead rein pony on acid through the passageway of doom, honking (or snorting, sounded like a honk to me ) to announce her presence to the main arena and passaging round the arena thinking she was some sort of mental, leg flailing, honking Valegro ...
Felt E59 didn't go well... being generally tense all the way through. However she did stay with me and was rideable so we are still improving! Then I had a complete brain fart, thought I had a few more competitors before me so was just mooching about on a long rein when I got called in for our Medium test, sorry Topaz! With no half passes or walk pirouettes practiced in we went, with slightly less passage happening this time but lacking connection and a bit of energy.
Managed a rather swizzy 67% and overall first in the E59 :lol: and a very fair 64% for our unprepared M69.
Onto Regionals!
With her reaction at Bold Heath I decided to go early for the arena walk, which went well until she heard the horses before us leaving the arena and decided a bit of flail'y piaffe was required :lol:, worked her a bit in the outdoor to settle her and then popped her away in her temp stable.
Ready to go :lol: think Topaz wants our top door to go higher...
We then very helpfully lost our flash strap in between our arena walk and tasking up for our warm up... So sans security blanket, I couldn't quite settle her in the warm up so never quite got her completely chilled, every time we settled something would spook her. However she tried so, so hard in the actual test, yes we were still a little tense making the connection brittle which resulted in fluffing the simple changes and a jog step in the walk.
We were never going to top the board, especially as we were in the Gold section, though with only 7 in the class we were guaranteed a rosette :lol:. Though I didn't expect to split the judges so much, judge at C had us on 61%, judge at E 67%... think we'll go with the judge at E :lol:.
So 64% and 7th out of 7 but our very first, very shiny and special Regional rosette!!!!
and the test!
[video=youtube_share;RXXFZb1VWGo]https://youtu.be/RXXFZb1VWGo[/video]
[video=youtube_share;x2saP5Y-wPY]https://youtu.be/x2saP5Y-wPY[/video]
Bring on the Petplan finals
.So I figured we should probably dip our toes back in to the dressage world and see if Topaz remembered how to dressage
. Made a trip out to run through the regional test to Bold Heath last Sunday, and it was blooming chilly! Arrived and Topaz decided to act like she had never left our yard and certainly had never graced an indoor before
. Her behaviour included and wasn't limited to, spooking at the mounting block (it was yellow ) loudly (snorting) and so dramatically other riders had to give us plenty of space , spooking at the viewing gallery, spooking at the passageway of doom, spooking at the banner next to the passageway of doom, spooking at the nice lady poo picking the warm-up , spooking at the open end of the arena, needing to be led like a lead rein pony on acid through the passageway of doom, honking (or snorting, sounded like a honk to me ) to announce her presence to the main arena and passaging round the arena thinking she was some sort of mental, leg flailing, honking Valegro ...Felt E59 didn't go well
... being generally tense all the way through. However she did stay with me and was rideable so we are still improving! Then I had a complete brain fart, thought I had a few more competitors before me so was just mooching about on a long rein when I got called in for our Medium test, sorry Topaz! With no half passes or walk pirouettes practiced in we went, with slightly less passage happening this time but lacking connection and a bit of energy. Managed a rather swizzy 67% and overall first in the E59 :lol: and a very fair 64% for our unprepared M69
. Onto Regionals!
With her reaction at Bold Heath I decided to go early for the arena walk, which went well until she heard the horses before us leaving the arena and decided a bit of flail'y piaffe was required :lol:, worked her a bit in the outdoor to settle her and then popped her away in her temp stable.
Ready to go
:lol: think Topaz wants our top door to go higher...
We then very helpfully lost our flash strap in between our arena walk and tasking up for our warm up... So sans security blanket, I couldn't quite settle her in the warm up so never quite got her completely chilled, every time we settled something would spook her. However she tried so, so hard in the actual test, yes we were still a little tense making the connection brittle which resulted in fluffing the simple changes and a jog step in the walk.
We were never going to top the board, especially as we were in the Gold section, though with only 7 in the class we were guaranteed a rosette :lol:. Though I didn't expect to split the judges so much, judge at C had us on 61%, judge at E 67%... think we'll go with the judge at E :lol:.
So 64% and 7th out of 7 but our very first, very shiny and special Regional rosette!!!!
and the test!
[video=youtube_share;RXXFZb1VWGo]https://youtu.be/RXXFZb1VWGo[/video]
[video=youtube_share;x2saP5Y-wPY]https://youtu.be/x2saP5Y-wPY[/video]
Bring on the Petplan finals
