Back in the Court

Saturday was TC's third show, and first outing all by himself. It was also one of my first shows in a while where I hauled all by myself. Something about doing Intro B on a four year old at a schooling show doesn't entice friends and family to want to get up at 6am to accompany me like doing a Grand Prix does. Weird. But I am appreciative that my parents were driving right by the show facility that morning to go to Costco, so they stopped in to take pictures.

Probably one of my favorite pictures of us, even though I don't
usually like posting trot pictures or my hands

Warming up while being charged away with, charging does do
wonders for his inside hind leg though

In the morning, I got to the barn with just enough time to gather stuff and load. Now I say I had time to load and I mean that I had just enough time to walk a willing horse into the trailer, not enough time just in case TC didn't want to get into a strange trailer by himself. I realized this stupid mistake AFTER I woke up and had no time to push my schedule earlier.

Luckily, I may be stupid, but TC is a saint so he hopped right in.

I left him in the trailer while I grabbed my number. The judge was running late so I took my time getting ready, walking TC all around the facility.

He was actually okay. He was a bit spooky and screamed in my face a bunch, but he stayed with me the whole time and improved when I put him to work walking and halting and reining back.

In the round pen, he was AWESOME. A little scared of one place where some flappy stuff was outside of the pen, but other than that, totally relaxed and willing. After he walked, trotted, and cantered with and without the chambon, it was about twenty minutes before my ride time so I led him over to the warm up.

I wish his chambon wasn't squishing his neck to make the dip
in front of his withers so pronounced... 

Return of the rogue left hand

He... was fine. I got on and he was just like at the neighbor's arena. He's literally never stepped in this arena in his life. And it was fine. We walked, trotted, and cantered. He was looking curiously around, so wasn't as through as he usually is, but there was very little tension and he felt as rideable as he had ever felt at a show.

Unfortunately the show was so small that our only other companion in the warm up, who TC had decided was his new best friend, left and disappeared around the corner for their test. TC was getting a little upset and I didn't want to push it, so we left and finished our warm up at the walk near the show ring. He was fine with that.

Lots of waiting

His color is doing weird shit

The first test was kinda meh. One thing I will say is there was NO spooking at the judges booth. He walked right up and then ignored it the whole time. Unfortunately, though, our new BFF was the ride before us. In a hope of being intelligent, we went in right as the horse halted to try to get around the arena a few times. Nope. Judge rang us in the second that horse was out of the court. So poor TC is trotting up centerline and juuuust noticing that new BFF is leaving the arena. THE HORROR.

All in all, it wasn't a bad test, but it was nothing to write home about. He stayed with me, but he was rigid in the neck at times and that made me rigid in my hand, which I fought to quell. I felt constricted by the test movements because I really wanted to spiral him in or do a transition or whatever to break up the tension in his back, but we were stuck on these huge circles so it was hard to get him back to me when he got distracted. Definitely something to work on at home- he needs to be ever more moveable on a straight line (like being able to push his ribcage out independently of an exercise, being able to bring him a bit overbent on a straight line, etc)

The free walk was basically just me leaning forward in hopes that I would weigh his front end down a bit to get him to stretch down. This is my fault as I really haven't focused much on it at home. Big wake up call for me since it's not like he's going to magically practice it on his own.

But we stayed in the court and he was much better than he had been at the last two shows.

If he'd just go like this all the time, no more dip in front of the
withers! I love how round he is here

He is so fun

There was no one in warm up (which was not visible from the show ring) and I didn't want him to get upset, so I opted to just hang out on him for the four rides between my two rides (both Intro B). He was fine with that, he stood quietly and watched new BFF the whole time, who was also waiting around. We did some leg yields and shoulder-in along the side of the arena, as well as worked on the free walk, since what better time to reinstall a movement than when wandering around the showgrounds between tests.

By the time we went back in, he felt pretty good. I picked up the trot and he had a coughing fit. The judge rang the bell. During our coughing fit. So I had to decide between going in or trying to do a weird loop around A to give him more time to stop coughing. I just went in because fuck it, I'm not going for scores here.

His tail is something else

Medium walk

This test was MUCH better, no regrets doing two tests. He was a lot more rideable and I felt like there were moments that mimicked what we get at home. There were also some moments where he didn't steer, got distracted by new BFF and other new BFF who he latched onto in the show ring itself when the horse walked by.

I was really pleased by our circles in that test, they were super soft and round. For the first time, our left circle actually contained the once illusive bend. Other than a moment of wanting to canter in the trot transition to the right, he was so great in the second half.

I feel like it's too bad that the Intro/Training tests are so simple and short, because I would have really liked to have another few circles in that test for him. Obviously that's not the point of dressage, but he really started to settle in the second half. I just need to hope for judges and scribes that take forever to write up the person before me so we get a solid couple of times around the ring.

CANTERING WOULD BE MORE FUN HERE

Super round in walk

The judging seemed odd to me. The scores weren't terribly off, although lower than I had expected, a 60% for our first test and a 62% for our second. After watching the videos, I probably would have gone 62/65 (and actually I "judged" it myself from the videos and calculated it and that was exactly what came out- although I am hardly an unbiased party).

The comments were weird though. There were no comments about how retracted he was in the first test, only comments about how I was riding too rigid in the hand, which is true, but hardly a theme. I was only rigid when he got away from me. But I agree that I should control that better.

Rigid right hand due to transition being
kind of expressive

Around the outside

The second test had a comment in the collectives about how he needs to be more uphill and a comment on a downward transition that he wasn't on his haunches. Nowhere in the purpose of the levels at Introductory level, or for that matter, Training or First level either, does it say that a horse needs to be uphill or be taking more weight behind. That starts at Second. I was surprised by those comments. I'd been pretty impressed with the other judges' comments at our other shows so this made me think a bit more.

I'm not claiming that an uphill balance won't help me out at Introductory level- TC is not a particularly downhill horse, but he does get rigid in the neck and drops his withers and we are working on that. But the uphill comment was equivalent to a comment at Training/First level saying "needs more collection," I mean yeah that'd be nice. If TC was more uphill and better balanced, maybe we'd be doing Second, but it isn't required at the level we're at so find another way of insinuating it if you really want to nail me for his balance. Something like "horse gets retracted in the neck and drops withers, loses balance" would be better. I feel like uphill should not be a word used at Introductory level unless it's a compliment. And the transition where he "wasn't on his haunches" was one where he tripped behind because he got distracted. "Needs better balance in downward transition" would be a much better comment than "not on his haunches."

He now has brown eyeliner, which is weird

Our halts aren't the best

It's a schooling show, I won't focus on the judging or the scores, since that is not why we are doing these anyway. But the odd comments and how quiet he was about showing did get me thinking about doing more clinics and less schooling shows for the rest of the year though. I mean, to really break it down, a schooling show is where I pay about a hundred dollars to go to a new place, ride in a new arena, and get feedback from an L judge. A clinic is where I pay about a hundred dollars to go to a new place, ride in a new arena, and get feedback from an S judge or an international competitor. Seems kind of stupid to do the former. But I do appreciate getting him in the routine of showing, but he seems to be embracing it now a bit more.

I'm even thinking of putting off our first rated show until the spring to possibly ride him in the Mary Wanless clinic this winter if I get my counter offer on this job. It's always been a goal of mine to ride with her, and what better way to torture myself with biomechanics than on a four year old, right? But I can't sit the trot on him (Carl Hester says that they don't ever sit on a young horse's back) so maybe it'd be better to wait until next year when I can get more out of it.

Despite the judging issues, I was so so pleased with him. My dad has never met him and was super impressed, which I was happy about because my dad always compares horses to Rico and TC is nothing much in comparison to Rico. TC loves everyone so I think my dad's impression of him was helped by TC's tendency to cuddle with everyone he meets.

TC loves attention

TC's First Show

Yesterday Ali and I hauled TC and her guy over to TC's first ever show! It was a little schooling show, very low key, which was exactly what we needed.

Best baby horse

The day before, we decided to take TC and Ali's western horse over to the neighbor's arena. I longed TC first, then got on and we headed out. 

TC is always worse in any location other than the small covered arena at his barn. That arena is surrounded by horses, and he can see his pasture-mates from it. It's even attached to the round pen where he was started. So FYI most of my posts have been about how he has been doing in that arena. Sometimes I ride in the field (where that one video took place) and it's okay, but that field also has horses and he can see his pasture. 

Warm up!

He wasn't so bad at the neighbor's place. The arena does have some other horses and he had his babysitter western friend in there. We got a nice relaxed trot and did a bunch of cantering with the idea that he'd be quieter at the show with more work the day before (it worked, phew). 

Then I thought it'd be a good idea to head into the other arena (about 10-12 feet away from the arena we were in, all totally visible), while Ali stayed in the original arena. This was to mimic the horse show environment. 

It was a disaster. 

He didn't do anything worse than shake his head, but he got so tense over his topline and retracted in the neck that he got pretty unrideable. Like some of our first rides! He basically loses all ability to steer, go on the bit, or stop when he gets like that. So I expected the worst at the show. 

Wandering around during the world's longest warm up

Yesterday morning we met another lady at the barn who wanted to groom for us, she was awesome! She painted their feet and brushed them off and held them whenever we needed.

We got to the facility, which is enormous, and TC unloaded quietly. We went on a walk and he was great- snorting occasionally but no spooking or being rude about things. He wanted to sniff every rock and flowerpot that he could find. 

Rocks are SO INTERESTING! I love this picture because it
shows him from a different angle that makes me think that this
is what he might look like when he's older... 

I picked up my number. It was so weird being like "number 164 for introductory B," I haven't ridden an intro test in a show since I was fourteen. I also haven't had a three year old to show ever so there you go. 

We went for a longe. I had Ali lead her horse down to the arena and stay on the outside. He was pretty good on the longe, nice and quiet, so we ended up taking Ali's horse slowly further away as I took TC to the other end. He watched the other horse but never did anything stupid. 

I hopped on and we started working near the gate. Ugh. Baby horses. At shows. For the first fifteen minutes, the FULL length of Rico's FEI warm up, TC trotted around with his head straight up in the air, struggling to keep his legs somewhat under him. Slowly but surely after about 30 minutes, he started to relax a bit. By about 40 minutes we were pretty ready for a motherfucking walk trot test, but we had to wait a LOT. I had been on him about an hour when we went in. 

So much warm up

With what had happened the day before, and seeing that someone else did this, I walked in and told the judge that TC was three years old, it was his first show, and that it would be great if I could have Ali's horse hang out in the ring with us (not dressage court, obviously, but in the ring). She said yes! Which was very sweet, so I thanked her and also told her that if she rang the bell near me, I might die. 

We trotted around the ring twice before she yelled "is he okay now?" and I said "yep!" which was kind of a lie, but no amount of trotting around was going to settle him. 

Let me say a few positives about the test and how he was in the new ring:

- most of his legs stayed in the court

- he didn't spook at the judge's booth

- he didn't spook at the horses next door jumping over big show jumps (when he's never once seen a horse jump bigger than a small log), he did look at them though

- he didn't buck, rear, bolt, or leap randomly into the air

- one could argue that he went on the bit most of the time (with his neck retracted though)

- his walk was actually really good despite what the judge thought

Learning (slowly) to stretch his neck down

A moment of fanciness amidst centerline wiggling!

We headed up centerline and he ricocheted off of my legs and reins like a pinball. We halted, kind of straightish before he curled his neck and stared at the now suddenly jumping horses. From the halt, he actually trotted okay before we careened around the corner and proceeded to do the weirdest form of haunches-in I've ever felt due to the horses next door jumping that he HAD TO LOOK AT. 

He complained about how the circle at E was a circle and not a square, so almost leapt out of the court. When he realized I wasn't going to let him out, he shook his head at me and was like WHY SERIOUSLY WHY?!

The walk transition... wasn't happening at K. So we careened around the corner and I manually put him into walk (we got a "very braced into walk"). Then he walked like a dream, aside from me deciding that he was NOT going to be getting all of the rein in the free walk, as we were free walking straight at the jumpers. 

Still a bit tense in warm up, dip in front of withers = tense

The medium walk was good, but the judge thought it was tense for a 6. He was tense the whole test and that tiny bit of medium walk was the only time he relaxed, but I'm sure his friesianness made him look more tense than he actually was in that walk. 

The trot was probably better than it was the other way at first, but then we tried to circle and once again he found himself only able to complete 3/4 of a circle. I thought I had planned it to get him to not fall out so much, but I overshot it (so hard to steer when he's a 2x4) and he put both hind legs out of the arena. 

To his credit, he didn't spook, get upset, or really do anything other than quietly put both legs back in the ring and headed down the long side at the trot. Good baby! Our final centerline was a bit charge-y and he flew laterally into the halt, then tripped so his face went STRAIGHT UP into the air and the judge thought he was doing that at me (he wasn't). 

The walk! How is this not a 10?! But he didn't overtrack due to
tension so there you go

So you could say that we were pretty impressive. 

The judge was nice at the end, asked me what breed he was, and said "wow he can really retract his neck" and I just laughed and agreed. So many people said that to me yesterday though oh my god, I wanted to throw my gold medal and his three months of dressage training at them and yell "WE'RE WORKING ON IT" but that would be inappropriate. The horse has come a long long way with the retraction of his neck but it's definitely his default when he gets tense so it came back yesterday. Over time, that will go away, but the tendency will always be there. He'll always need a rider that rides back to front, which is challenging when he zooms off with you. 

She gave us a 61.6% and said "what a brave boy!" on the back. I think she thought I was nuts to bring a seemingly barely broke three year old to a horse show, but I promised everyone who asked that he was excellent at home and that he just gets nervous sometimes and can't control his body parts! He just needs more miles. 

Look at this cute face! My whole family
told me that he wasn't that cute tonight...
rude!

Next show: May 9th! Maybe next time we keep all four legs in the court. 

Intermediare I

I officially own an Intermediare I horse! Last year at this time, we were gearing up for our first 4-2 at the beginning of June. That's moving up 4 tests (well, we skipped the 4-3) in a year, what a horse :)

My favorite picture from the show last year

He still charges up centerline after the halt

I heard from my vet this morning, he's not convinced that the results were indicative of anemia or ulcers. He says the value that the local vet gave me was merely blood volume and that he could lose blood volume from not having enough water in him (anemia also causes this, hence the diagnosis). Tomorrow I'm going to forward the blood results to my vet (I use a local vet for easy stuff, shots, etc, since they're not expensive. But my vet is a performance horse vet who treated Rico's many injuries so I trust him a LOT) and we'll go from there. He's on ranitidine and will be on it until we figure all of this out, it just makes his tummy (and his rider) feel better.

We got the go ahead, of course, to show today.

My plan was just to head in that direction and if Rico said no to showing, I'd scratch. He was pretty game to show, more forward than he has been (although not back to normal, he was a little not-so-engaged all day), and enthusiastic about doing passage and piaffe, which was great but those weren't required in our test.

I bathed him and braided him, then threw him in the trailer to head off to Dressage at the Gaits. It was VERY windy, since my test was in the afternoon and it's always windy there in the afternoon. I didn't mind. In fact, I would have appreciated more flapping plastic bags and maybe a loose dog, or maybe that kid riding the bike could have fallen and started screaming... Sorry, I take that back. But Rico doesn't care about wind.

All braided and pretty

Our warm up was alright. It included several reining spins instead of pirouettes to the right, a few perfect lines of tempis, and me trying to remember how to ride the zig zag in a court since I hadn't ever ridden it before.

It wasn't a strong warm up, but it wasn't terrible, and I headed over early.

The test itself was... green. We earned a 63.7%, with some good highlights. We got a 7 on our zig zag, which I had just learned to ride several minutes before. We also got a 6.5 on our left pirouette! Plus an 8 on our last centerline, a bunch of 7s/7.5s on our walk and trot work, and some really nice comments noting that Rico is very talented and that I need to get my shit together. Typical.

Had to get a picture of those scores

We had some questionable moments as well. Rico thinks that throwing in extra changes are cool, so we did a nice line of 2s up centerline for a generous 5. We also have a very very unruly right pirouette which was basically two bad half pirouettes (but NOT reining spins though, success!) for a 4. He also threw in a couplet (one one-tempi) as we went across the diagonal for our extended canter. The judge didn't see and we got a 6 with the comment "conservative," yes ma'am I was conservative, my horse wanted to do one-tempis instead!!

But overall, given how things have been going, I was VERY happy. I still think something is going on, we're making more diet changes (over the course of several weeks, I was a pony clubber), and I'm going to see what my vet thinks about scoping him for ulcers or running more tests.

After how happy he was today, I think I'll do at least one day with Alfredo, and pull out of the second day if Rico is clearly not happy. After that...

Kind of overkill for two people

Camping!! Boyfriend and I are going to try out our new tent and all of our camping stuff at a place nearby before we head up to Portland for our summer camping trip.

I'll have pictures from today soon!

Dressage at the Gaits!

It's OVER!!! Let me start by saying that my horse is amazing and we won our 4-2 class with a 65.5%! We won!!! 65.5%!!

He was SO EXCITED to be there!

Alright so from the beginning! I woke up this morning at 5am feeling quite sick. I've been going nonstop for a month now with finals, graduation, numerous client horse shows, and my own show today. Now I finally get a break! Until tomorrow. Anyway, Rico was fairly relaxed when I went out to braid him around 7 so I was convinced that I was going to have a lazy horse in the test. I was beginning to feel so glad that I found my big spurs last night!

Upon arriving at Gilroy Gaits and getting on my animal though, I realized that he was far from lazy. He was beyond stoked to be at a new place AND to be showing that when I started trotting in warm up, I couldn't exactly control him. Every time my spur would touch him, he'd shake his neck and fling whatever leg was in the air much higher. I'm sure we looked completely ridiculous, especially with my ongoing commentary of "we don't need to be this fancy, it's fine if we're not this fancy," to try to calm him down. At the canter he flung himself around the arena, doing lead changes and threatening to buck me off.

By the time we got into the test, I had gone from "I really hope we get a good score so I can justify buying a shadbelly," to "I don't want to fall off, please don't buck me off." All I wanted to do was get through the test without falling off. And we did that and a bit more!

Look at the surprising amount of relaxation!

After the test I was a bit hard on myself. The right pirouette was more of a reining spin and the left one wasn't as good as we've had at home. But honestly, there were no big mistakes which is HUGE for us. The only problem I was a bit miffed about was that an airplane landed next door and Rico would NOT stop staring at it through an entire walk pirouette (which we got a 6.5 on, go figure). I came out feeling like we did our best for where we are in training, and I was just hoping that the score would be over 60.

This horse likes airplanes...?

When I went to pick up my test, I looked at the scoreboard first and found my name with 65.5% and a little 1 next to it. WE WON! I went into the office and got my prize (some fly spray!), ribbon, and test. I was immensely surprised by this! I had expected somewhere between 57% and 61% based on how unsteady the test felt to me and how bad the pirouettes were.

Most of our scores were in the 6-7 range, but we got an 8 on our first centerline AND an 8 on the tempi changes. The collectives were the most exciting part of the test. Rico always gets a 7 on gaits, so that wasn't surprising, but the 7 on impulsion was a great surprise! We earned a 6.5 on submission, which is what I expected, especially because he kind of got distracted by an airplane during a walk pirouette. As for rider scores, I earned a 7 on position and a 6.5 on effect of the aids. And... we got a 7 on harmony between horse and rider! That means a lot to me, because I was once told "you'll never be able to ride this horse elegantly."

Our tempis which earned an 8!! Not lacking expression...

a 7 on this medium trot!

Half pass right

Overall, I'm immensely proud of this animal. He tried really hard today, even though he was super excited about being there and could have completely ruined the test. I felt like I could really ride him through the test, which is not a feeling I normally get with that animal.

The fanciest

I adore this picture

And this one!

I feel like the door to Prix St George is wide open and I'm definitely going to be shopping for a shadbelly soon! I'm not sure exactly when I'll be doing PSG, but I do know that it's closer now than it's ever been :)

Future FEI horse :)