Amidst a Windstorm

On Saturday afternoon, I had a mild mental break down! Yay! Essentially I've just been pushing and pushing, as per usual, and I hit a wall. So you know, that was cool.

Sunday morning, I woke up at 5am and was pulling into the barn at 5:40. I had just enough time to braid and pack before loading TC and heading up to our very first (and last) show of the year, where we'd be making our (rated) Second level debut, finally.

I mean, aside from the mental breakdown on Saturday, things began to go wrong when I got to the barn and discovered that, because PG&E is a SHIT company and instead of fixing their shit so they stop causing the state of California to burn to death every year, they have opted instead to just cut power randomly to hundreds of thousands of residents. I am not one of them, at least at my home, but the barn was. Great. So I quickly loaded TC in the dark at 5:50 and we were on our way to the show.

Love that uphill balance and split behind, and this is his weak
lead right now!

As we were driving to the show, a windstorm hit us. I felt it shake my trailer with my very wind-averse horse in it. Cool, cool.

We got to the show and I've never experienced a windstorm like this. Everything was blowing sideways and literal branches of trees were on the ground blowing around. I unloaded and began braiding.

It was frigid cold and TC was beginning to freak out due to wind, so I went inside toward the arena and set him up ground tying near a mounting block. He calmed right down and relaxed a bit, so I felt less like a terrible horse owner. I shoved braids into his mane and then went back and got dressed, listening to him scream and pace and generally freak out by the trailer. I got him tacked up and took him inside to warm up.

Warm up started out okay, we trotted around and he was tense but handling it okay. Then he relaxed. Then he bucked so hard that I nearly came off. I got flung to the left and hooked my right spur on him, he bucked due to that so I went to fall right and hung my left spur on him, he bucked again and I managed to sit up. I yelled at him while he was making a good effort to buck me off "YOU ARE NOT BUCKING ME OFF FOR THE FIRST TIME AT A SHOW" because your logical brain is just OUT the window in that situation.

A bit leany but such a good pony

When I got done being nearly launched, I turned to see several people who had jumped up to come catch my loose horse and pick me up, as well as all the riders halting their horses looking horrified. All is well, people, continue your warm up, I'm sorry for the disruption. I got offered a longe line but I'm too much of a stubborn idiot to take anyone up on that. Why am I like this?

I continued my warm up and we just cantered for days. He settled a bit, but was still very tense, we did not really have a walk... Soon I was told I could head over.

I figured I'd just go see how he was, maybe he would be fine in the wind.

He was vehemently not fine, he was better than I thought, but he did keep bolting and bucking in the small warm up arena next to the show ring. I actually said the words "I need to scratch" but then kept going.

Oh hey, it's me, not scratching. Look at all those damn leaves!

Soon it was our turn and he had a good 3 minutes of not bolting or bucking, so I decided to be stupid go in. I warned the judge that I was probably going to trot around and then withdraw. I just wanted to get him around the show ring. Then he took a deep breath and tuned right in. Like he saw the court and the judge and the crowd (I think people came to watch me die from warm up) and he was like OH YES PROFESSIONAL SHOW HORSE COMING THROUGH.

We went down centerline and I felt him surge coming in, he was so excited to be back in the ring. We halted for a 7 and then went in for our first medium. I felt him want to GO and so I held him back and we got another 7 with the comment "little out behind" which like, yep, gotta fix that shit, but the tension wasn't helping either. Our transitions earned a 6 because I was so slow to start, unsure of whether he'd go to launch me or not.

The shoulder-in pattern rode well, except he got wiggly about a GIANT FUCKING BRANCH (okay not that giant but still, a legit branch) on the track, so we got a 6.5 for the first shoulder-in, solid 7 for the second. Our rein back wasn't great, again tension meant that he didn't keep his hind legs as far under him, so we got a 6.5 on that. Then a 7 on medium walk and 6 on free walk (uh, not letting go of the reins, kay?).

Not certain about this decision of mine

The canter started terribly with a 4.5 as he stuttered into it, threatened to bolt, then lost his lead behind and had to pick it up again. After that bullshit, I wasn't going to let him go in a medium so we got a 5 with "unclear"

BUT then we got a pair of 8s for our circle and counter canter and a couple of 7s for our transitions after that. The medium canter the other way also started out with him considering taking off with me, so we got a 6 saying "show more difference" yes judge, yes.

We got another 8 on the next circle "good balance" yay but then a 6.5 on the counter canter on the left lead because he got crooked, mostly because I felt him want to change so I swept his haunches a bit. Another 4 on our right lead canter depart because AGAIN he went to bolt through it but I stopped him "disobedient"

Then we ended the test (!!! we finished!) with 6.5s on our medium and transitions and a 7 on centerline.

Turn off centerline, all our trot pictures were very tense, that's
the gait he shows the most tension unfortunately

Collectives were a 7 on gaits (so respectable given how he was that day AND moving up a level), a 6.5 on impulsion (I bet suppleness of the back and engagement is a big deal there), a 6 on submission with (attention and confidence, as well as acceptance of aids, circled), and I got 7s on both rider position and rider effectiveness.

Comments said that he was a lovely horse who was a bit distracted, but that we were a good pair who works together nicely.

It's blurry but I was so glad to get through
the test that I gave him a hug, he is skeptical

I walked out and decided to scratch the 2-3 if my score was at all low, then decided that I just fucking DIDN'T WANT TO SHOW IN THE FUCKING WIND so decided to scratch anyway. There's no way we'd have walk pirouettes in there and those were supposed to carry the sometimes questionable counter canter pattern in that test for us. Not worth it.

I went to collect my score, a 65.81%, totally respectable for our very first time out at this level! I'm bummed that it was such a stressful day (and weekend) but so glad that he held it together despite being so nervous. I really think he loves showing and that the show ring itself helped him calm down and get focused. And I'm glad I made the decision to scratch the 2-3.

And that's a wrap! Easiest show year ever, just one show, one test, one... insane windstorm. Hopefully next year is a bit better, I think we're on our way to being able to kill it at Second level. Woohoo!

Making Headlines Just for Kicks

This title is part of a song I like: New Bohemia by Transviolet, I'm not so vain, we did not make any headlines, but it was a pretty amazing day.

I was so glad to have stayed in the hotel overnight (and also glad that I opted for the less sketchy option of my hotel choices) because I was able to sleep in a bit, get a free breakfast, and it only took 5 minutes to drive over to the show! I don't think I'm going to be so opposed to doing multi-day shows... except for the expense of it.

TC and I went for a walk when I first got to the show, and then I gave him some food, re-braided him, and got to watch the Prix St George class before going back to meet Kate, who again drove up the night before to eat dinner with me and then came BACK to see us go on Sunday.

Caught me mid-half halt! 

He's so much fun omg

I got on a bit later on Sunday than on Saturday because I didn't think TC would have so many basilisk moments and he didn't! In fact, the horse that came out was as good as I could have asked him to be. We did the absolute minimum warm up before heading in.

The first test, which was 1-2, felt really good. The only parts I was disappointed in was the leg yields and the canter lengthening to the left. The leg yield pattern just sucks in that test, TC's leg yields get better and more cadenced as they get steeper, and the 1-2 leg yield is super shallow. Half way through, I felt like I kind of phoned it in on both of them. Like it was a little too easy and I just dumped him over rather than really focused on making him take big loose steps. The left lead canter lengthening started out amazing but then I let him swap in front for a couple of steps. Gah!

But the judge didn't seem to think it was that bad. Literally other than our two centerlines, no score was under a 7. We got 8s on both leg yields (lol okay), the canter circle right, the stretch circle, and the lengthening to the right. Four eights and two of them on double coefficients!! We grabbed 7.5s on a ton of other things too, like the left canter circle, the free walk, the second lengthening in trot. Comments: Athletic, talented horse. Improve halts! because once again both our centerlines were 6s, so embarrassing!! The collectives nearly made me cry. An 8 on gaits and rider position, 7.5s on impulsion and rider effectiveness, and a "low" 7 on submission since he always scores lowest there due to TC-antics.

Lengthening

He's so pretty D: 

Final score was a 73.4%. What the actual hell. When Kate told me I got goosebumps. One paragraph of sappiness and then on to the next test okay? I've been battling against TC and my past when it comes to my confidence in the pair of us this year. He was a horse I found in a pasture who was going to be sold as a trail horse. I took a chance on him, his lateral canter, his choppy trot, his sensitive mind.

We've gone through so much, this horse has terrified me, he's been for sale, I've hated him. But we continued to push through and now I'm that person that always annoyed me with their fancy horse and their refusal to move up before scoring like this. This was the second highest score of the day, behind a very good rider on a very nice horse. This was only one of a few scores in the 70s the judge handed out all day. I'm so proud of this test and so beyond proud of this horse.

Telling him he's the best pony and he's like "Yis I know this already"

Uuuunfortunately the horse is probably only a three test weekend kinda guy. We kept our next warm up very very short and went in to put in a very respectable 1-3 test. Both leg yields got 8s again in the zig zag, and we also grabbed an 8 on our canter lengthening left. Lots of 7.5s including the right lead canter circle and both counter canter loops. I can't believe how well he's scoring at his canter work, which was always 6s/6.5s last year.

Unfortunately in this test, I lost my outside aids after the canter lengthening we got an 8 on, and he went careening out of the arena. Like the universe saw my ego inflating and needed to remind me that despite grabbing a high score, just an hour later I could totally lose power steering.

Sweet summer child so happy about the lengthening that she
takes her outside aids off riiiiight about here

Just... lol we are not supposed to be on this side of the court

Luckily it's happened enough before where I stopped him before he completely left. He had one leg left in the arena. That's not an elimination. The judge didn't ring the bell. We continued.

At the end of the test I said thank you, apologized, and immediately asked if we'd been eliminated. We had not. The judge had said that not all legs left the arena so we were okay! I was SO RELIEVED. I didn't even care what the score was, I knew it was in the 60s at least and that we were going to qualify for All Breeds. PHEW.

It was a good score, a 69.2%. I was a bit disappointed, seeing as the transition from the lengthening to the working canter got brought down to a 4 from a 7.5. That's my 70%. Boo. But sometimes after you've had a really amazing life changing dressage test, you need your horse to try to jump out of the arena just to make sure you don't get too cocky. So here I am, not too cocky about the show.

I am still happy though

But really, this was such an amazing weekend. These four scores are the highest scores he's gotten at First level, and we got blue ribbons for all of them. The tests were as clean as they're going to get given the horse I have currently. The judge loved him. I actually got a lot of compliments that weren't just "wow you can really sit some shit" like I normally get when he's kind of a nut. It's just so nice to feel like our hard work is paying off.

Once again I feel like I just need to believe in us a little more. The trajectory we're on is great, my trainer is great, I'm finally feeling fit enough to ride him, and he gets better and better the more places we go. I can't wait to see how things go for us in the future.

We have a little break between now and our potential next show. I'm not sure if I just want to end the year on this high note and come out next spring at Second or if I want one more show this year for miles and to possibly try 2-1 before winter. Who knows. I'm sure I'll have a long winding post about it later.

For now I'm just ecstatic. 

Some Nice Basics

Friday night I got off work and went straight home to get everything ready for TC's first ever overnight show this last weekend. And, looking back, my first overnight dressage show since 2009! The facility was the same as the one we were at last October, so TC has been there, though if you remember, this was the show where TC bolted up centerline, literally entering at A... spooking. Damn this blog name.

You guys

The whole weekend was basically me asking "is this actually
my horse??" for better or for worse lol

The drive wasn't bad other than a bit of traffic right as we got on the highway. TC unloaded great and walked around the property without any issues. We found his stall and I stuck him in there while I brought all my stuff in. It was so nice to have the stall! I totally get why people do this (as I'm writing this on Saturday night from my hotel room 6 minutes away from the facility). The stall was a gigantic permanent one, so it had an auto water trough and I wasn't worried about TC climbing on anything, becoming cast, or poking his nose through the wall to talk to anyone.

By the time I got everything unloaded and changed into my show clothes, it was time to get on. I had wanted about 45 minutes to warm up just in case TC was a dingbat. And let me tell you, TC was a dingbat.

His new thing is to be walking totally calm and normal on a loose rein, squeal loudly, and then leap into basilisk mode. So we did that and then cantered for like 15 minutes. There was some porpoising, but it was much less obnoxious than the video I had posted last week.

There were still some antics, it is TC after all

The beginning of that naughtiness, oops

The nice thing about this facility is the enormous covered arena with mirrors to warm up in. So while I was trying to get TC to chill out, we did a lot of great stuff. I schooled the shoulder-in and half passes. The shoulder-in looks great! The half pass needs a bit more balance before it's ready for the show ring, he gets a bit stacked up in it. We also schooled some counter canter, which I like doing (for now) in the bigger rings to get him used to riding it without having it be so hard. And we did a few walk pirouettes, which were foot perfect!

He did eventually settle into his work, but it was a little tense. I worked really hard to get him to stretch into contact but he mostly wanted to just run past his tempo and get short in the neck. Cool.

Petting him in the stretch circle to try to keep him stretching
rather than running off with me... 

That inside hind leg is making me so happy these days! And
when he was so tense in warm up too

Unfortunately the first test, after TC did another walk-quietly-then-squeal maneuver as we were getting ready to go in, reflected this. But we only had one bobble, a scoot after C. The rest of the test went pretty well, especially given what we had in warm up.

Highlights were 7.5s on the trot loopy thing to the right, the stretch circle, the free walk, the change of rein at the canter, and the second trot lengthening! Everything else was 7s and a few 6s/6.5s. The entire show (four classes, eight centerlines), I got 6s on our centerlines and halts. It was really annoying. But overall for this test, we got a 69.2%, one of our highest scores! Comments were: Talented horse! Continue to improve bend and stretch fwd and down for suppleness in the back. Agreed!

His lengthenings are much better when he's not tense from
being am idiot in warm up, oh well

Turn, TC, turn!

TC was pretty settled in the warm up for our second test, just a few zippy moments. We schooled all the movements and everything felt really good. He was stretching into contact a little better too! I mean the horse probably cantered for like 40 minutes that day...

Back into the ring and we had a really respectable test. There was one major issue, in that he scooted and bucked pretty good in our second 15m canter circle for a pretty glorious four.

Highlights included the 7.5 and 8 we got on the leg yields (!! this horse took me literal years to get him to let me push him sideways) with the comment "quite fluid" which it was. We got another 8 on the canter circle to the right, and 7.5s on both counter canter loops. I kind of messed up my canter lengthenings because they are only supposed to go 3/4 of the way down the long side and I went all the way down. Oops. No error but we got a 6.5 on the transition.

We ended with a 70% right on the nose! And we won (there was another person in the class, she missed us by .5 points). It was super amazing to hit 70%! And on such a hard test! I was SO so so excited about this. We've been so close to 70% in the past and we finally got it! The comments were great too, the judge said: Lovely horse! Will be super when a bit more confident and focused. Some nice basics! and like... man it feels so good to get a comment on the basics. I work so hard on those! We really only school movements 1-2x/week at this point.

Leg yield left, the judge loved our leg yields this show! They
are coming along nicely 

He's such a cool horse

At the end of the day, Kate came up for dinner! I've been having some issues with my anxiety lately and so Kate drove all the way out to come out with me on Saturday night (and then came out to help me on Sunday too!) despite having to teach all day on Saturday and on Sunday morning. So thank you Kate, that meant SO MUCH to me. We went out to sushi and got boba and then went and visited TC before I went to my hotel and watched a movie/wrote this post.

Stay tuned for the next day, which goes even better!!

A Enter Spooking

The second day of the show started off well. TC actually let me braid him without taking everything out of my pockets and distributing the contents across the cross ties. It was much cooler that day, so I was glad that I got to the show facility a bit early. TC and I went for a short walk to go get my First 1 test from the day before and visited the warm up.

He was thinking about playing here and I look like I've  never
been on the back of a horse before, but I love this picture

I read the comments from 1-1 and was a bit disappointed. There were moments where she threw us 7s, but the overall comments cited needing more impulsion. She really wanted him to cover a lot more ground, which is totally fair. She also circled suppleness of the back and engagement of the hindquarters, and also noted that he "explodes at times."

At this point in TC's abilities at shows, this is too much to ask of him. I can get more oomph in his gaits, but that's at the expense of tension. We're still working on relaxation in new places. So as I was walking around, I decided to scratch my First level test that day. It's just not worth it if we're not meeting the general expectations of the level. I'm not willing to push him past positive tension in the show ring. He just needs to mature a little bit more first. I'm glad I did it the first day, even just to know that First is still beyond our capabilities in a new place.

When we get a little tense, we get a little expressive

He's actually putting on muscle, yay

Knowing that we just had one test, I did some extra work in warm up before Training 2. TC once again started out a bit tight and then settled in that arena. It takes him a good five minutes to settle in a new arena, which is pretty much as long as a Training level test lasts. Cool.

Warm up went well, I was able to do some more transitions than before and also cantered him a fair amount. I figured I wanted a different problem than the porpoising from the day before (spoiler alert, I got it).

We headed over to the dressage court early and I used their small square arena off the show ring to trot and canter around. I figured it'd help a lot, and he did porpoise a few times there, so that was good. I shut him down a bit more firmly than I had in the show ring the day before, and soon he was quietly cantering around.

Around the outside of the arena, we trotted and trotted. He felt really good! I was thinking that this test may actually go pretty well. Then we entered the arena.

A: Enter Spooking... ugh

Why did I name my stupid blog the way I did? It was just a placeholder name but then I got some followers and it seemed odd to change it. I'm still thinking about changing it even after so many years!

So yah I literally turned up centerline and he was like FUCK YES SHOWING and tried to take off into the arena. I shut him down and then trotted over to X and halted, laughing. The judge gave me a 6.5 (the halt and after the halt was quite good) and said "nice recovery :)"

After that, the test went super! I let him out further for the stretch circle, which raised our score from a 6 and 6.5 the day before to an 8. The canter work was pretty brilliant, grabbing us a bunch of 7.5s. I was pleasantly surprised by that. He did go to play a little bit in each direction, but I stopped him and it actually just made the canter more impressive. The judge said "good call" for one of them and "he responded!" in another. Good pony.

We only had one more issue in the ring, where instead of doing a quiet walk to trot transition at C, in front of the judge, he tried to take off again. Again I stopped him quickly and went to work, but that gave us a 5 and the following trot circle was tense.

Across the diagonal

Thinking about running off but making the right decision

Overall we grabbed a 70% and second place, right behind the judge who was judging at the show three years ago when I got my Gold! I don't mind losing (only by three points, why did you zip off with me twice, pony!) to someone like that. She's an amazing rider.

The overall comments were great, the judge clearly was a lot happier with him the second day (and he was more relaxed so that makes sense). Said that if I could get him softer in his poll and more connected, that he was going to be great. That's exactly what we're working on! So that's great to have everything really consistent like that.

Across the diagonal

Such a good pony

The whole show was such a good experience. Even though the scores were not as great as they could have been, I was so happy by the end of the weekend. We went to a new place. We competed in a rated show. We didn't totally embarrass ourselves. I wasn't scared.

We have a long way to go still with showing, but given that I wasn't riding this horse at the beginning of the year because he scared me so much, I'm REALLY happy.

Our fall adventures aren't quite over, but the show season is. I have some fun stuff planned this fall with TC, but the pressure is off until the spring. It feels good to have had almost a full season with him, definitely didn't expect that at the beginning of the year!

Loves to Show

This past weekend, TC and I were at our final show of the year! I had been feeling very apprehensive coming up to the show. Very apprehensive. Like to the point where I wanted to scratch. Even putting him in the trailer, I thought about turning the other way on the freeway and heading down to the one day event that Kate and her crowd was at the same weekend and just being like "I JUST WANT TO PLAY IN THE WATER COMPLEX AND JUMP A TINY LOG OKAY?" but no, I paid for this show, and we were going.

So much could go wrong. TC hasn't been to a brand new facility since the Jeremy Steinberg clinic, where he was fine, but very tense. This was a brand new facility. I had also had my Tracey lesson deflate me a bit, so the last week of riding, TC had been bucking in the canter like... the whole time. Or slamming on the brakes as we went into canter and sticking his head straight up in the air. Or running sideways kicking out at my right leg/seat bone/side in general. It was a rough week.

AND because I'm a genius, I signed him up for First 1, why not try a new level while we're at it?

I do like how his canter is developing rideability-wise

Such a good egg

But this show is important to me. It's the show I got my Gold at three years ago. I wanted to do this show the first year I had TC, but then he was a little nutty. Then the second year I almost signed up but he was still really not quite there. This time, we were going. I tried to feel the nostalgia and look at my three medals in the mirror as much as I could, but I was mostly in survival mode.

TC came off the trailer as he always does in a new place... with lots of presence. He was definitely more relaxed than he was for Jeremy's clinic, so that was good to see. He hasn't traveled a lot this fall due to me being sick and then gone for like every weekend. But he's slooowwwwly starting to figure out that the places I'm taking him are not horse cemeteries.

We went on a short walk near the show ring and then into the warm up. I've never thought this place was spooky, Rico never cared about it. And TC was surprisingly unspooky. He just hated the eurocizer that you had to walk by to get to the warm up arena. You know you've been on one, right, TC? I trotted him in the round pen near the warm up and all he wanted to do was stare into warm up and poke the people sitting near the round pen with his nose.

So I figured, fuck it, took him back to the trailer to tack up, and just got on him right then. I had my longe line, but never needed it.

Floppy ears :) 

Sassy 

The first five minutes of warm up were me riding a basilisk. He snaked his neck around and around and bounced around at trot and canter. At first I was pretty certain that I wanted to get off the pony ride. A few people goosed us and he was threatening to take off with me. I really didn't want to be THAT person in warm up. Luckily, the weather was on our side. It was 85 degrees outside and he still has his winter coat. It only took about five minutes for it to really hit him, so by the time I was even thinking that this whole show was a bad idea, he settled into work.

We had a GREAT warm up. My plan was to go and just get as far as we could at this show. By the end of warm up, he felt super through and quiet, but not too tired. At that point, I was ecstatic to be at the show. Talk about feeling ALL the emotions that day.

Despite the good warm up, as we walked to the show arena, it really hit me. I'm about to go into an arena my horse has never been in, and put a permanent score on his record. Fuck. Fuck fuck fuck. I started to really get nervous.

Me wondering if this is a good idea

Looking mostly under control

But there wasn't toooooo much to be worried about. TC trotted around that arena like he owned it. He didn't care when the horse in front of us left. He didn't care when a guy at the house nearby started murdering babies cutting wood or something. He didn't care about a motorcycle going by. He didn't care about the automatic gate opening for a trailer (he cared a little). He just strutted his stuff and we got some really good scores. Lots of 7s and even an 8 on a canter transition!

Unfortunately, strutting his stuff meant LEAPING in all the canter work. Remember my issue keeping him in front of the leg in the show ring? Well, we now have a new issue. I asked him to canter and he was like FUCK YES I LOVE TO CANTER LET'S DO THIS and porpoised down the long side, then put in a respectable circle. The other direction he picked it up real nice (8!), then porpoised for most of the circle (5!). Mmmkay.

The last bit of porpoising was kind of hilarious. I could tell he was just SO EXCITED TO BE SHOWING. I really love how much he seems to love showing. He gets nervous in new places, but I think I've done a good job this year with all of the shows, making it super fun for him.

Too fun.

I got to the end of the test and dissolved into laughter. It was such a bad test. But I mean, I walked him out of this brand new arena on a loose rein and he was totally chill and proud of himself.

Coiling

Could you not?

A few strides later I mostly had him under control. PS, I stand up
when he acts up because of my back injury, I'm safe from whiplash
up there and better able to control him. It just looks silly

Our First level test was nothing to write home about either. He squealed into trot while going around the outside of the arena, so we had some rough bits in the trot in the beginning. Then he porpoised in the first canter transition so refused to do his canter lengthening at all (he gave me a "but I'm so tired after leaping, could we not?"). Then threatened to run off with me the entire fifteen meter circle and onto the diagonal.

The other way at the canter wasn't too much better, though we did show a lengthening! The highlight for me was the last trot lengthening, which just felt downright powerful. But he was a bit tight over his back in general in it though, so the judge marked us down accordingly.

Honestly, I wasn't in a great mood directly after the first day because it just felt like a letdown. We started the year scoring in the 70s and we were now solidly in the low to mid 60s (61 and change at 1-1 due to some unfortunately placed 5s; 66 and change at T2 again due to unfortunate lower scores in the double coefficients).

But when I got home I realized that being annoyed at the results was, in itself, a win. He was so good there that my annoyance wasn't "my horse ran away with me every ten steps in the show ring" or "my horse wouldn't get near the judge's booth" or "my horse terrified me and I don't want to ride him anymore." It was "my horse thinks that showing is the most fun ever and couldn't contain his excitement enough for me to get higher numbers written on this piece of paper."

Trot trot trot

He is always SO proud of himself after tests

We still had the next day, so I was eager to just get more miles put on him and ignore the scores. There is time to obsess over scores later. I was not going to let it ruin the fact that I had a really fun day with my horse at a brand new place. It was the first fun day in a long time. He is hilarious and maybe thought that leaping through the tests was a good way to cheer me up. In a way, it definitely worked.

USDF Gold Medal

What a bittersweet day.

Sunset over the palm trees after my Gold Medal ride

I have such mixed emotions right now. I feel funny. I'm really freaking excited but at the same time so incredibly sad. I never get to canter down centerline with Rico again. That part of my life and our partnership is over. He's the most incredible horse I have ever had the pleasure of working with. He's so willing, steady, sane, and sweet. All of those wonderful parts of him came out today because it wasn't this clear cut woohoo it happened moment at the end of the test. 

Let me go over the happy parts of today first. We did get our USDF Gold Medal. We were in a large Grand Prix class. Five horses. We earned second place, only .7% behind the winner. We earned a 65.2%, our highest score yet at this level. We weren't even CLOSE to not earning the medal. The judge came up to me after and told me how great my horse was, asking all sorts of questions about him and telling me that we had done a nice job. 

We earned FOUR eights! An eight on the first and last centerline, an eight on the halt and rein back, and an eight on the zig zag!!! The zig zag! We earned a TON of sevens, so many freaking sevens. Including a seven on the RIGHT PIROUETTE. Are you kidding me? That pirouette was perfect. I felt him sit and keep cantering the whole time. We earned a ton of sevens on the passage and even a seven on our best piaffe.

An 8 on the zig zag, hard work pays off :)

But... I'm sad to report that Rico actually went lame today. I felt it developing in warm up. He wasn't as forward as he usually is (so you can imagine how tired my legs are right now), his changes were occasionally late behind and not always there. His passage was exceptionally uneven to start (he worked out of it eventually). He was so willing though, he wanted to make me happy.  And honestly he wasn't lame, he was just off. 

So we showed anyway. I kept him into the bridle so I could help support him. His once gorgeous trot mediums were completely gone. His ones weren't there at all (after eight ones at home the other day), we got maybe three in a row at one point. But he poured his heart out for me in that test and was so incredible the whole time in the movements he could do well. He never stopped in the piaffe, he was right there with me in the zig zag and the pirouettes. He needed extra help and I gave it to him to the best of my ability. Heidi said I rode my ass off. 

The judge never rang the bell, he wasn't lame every step or anything. He never bobbed his head. He was just uncomfortable. It was only apparent to me and Heidi. 

I came out of the ring and everyone was so happy and congratulating me and people I didn't know were telling me how great it was. But Heidi and I walked away alone and I asked her when I was out of sight/hearing "was he lame" and she said "ehhhhh yes." She said it wasn't bad enough to ring the bell obviously but he was certainly uncomfortable. We made plans to ice him tomorrow and I made the decision later to scratch regardless of the score today. 

But then it was a 65.2%! I couldn't believe it. I was in this weird state of feeling incredibly torn between pushing him to come out tomorrow and scratching and wondering if he would be okay in the long run and suddenly I had my USDF Gold Medal. WHAT?! I feel like I haven't been able to properly enjoy it because of the suddenness and unexpectedness of it. It feels so completely unreal to me right now. I think I'm so preoccupied with his lameness that I can't properly feel excited yet.

Hoping he'll still be up for a trail ride when he feels better

So tonight he got some NSAIDs. And he gets tomorrow off in his pasture. And on Monday I'm going to hang out with him (and get some pictures of us together I hope).

Tomorrow I'm back at the show in the morning to coach my clients. I'm going to scratch tomorrow's test while I'm there as well. 

Pictures soon :) 

Intermediare II Photo Dump

I'm almost done editing pictures from the show this weekend!

Afterwards, I love this picture! Rico looks so tired though

I'm actually standing in the barn right now, these pictures took a while to upload so I got Rico ready to ride while I was waiting.

Today we're starting our new conditioning schedule- we were doing 8 minute sets of work and now we're moving up to 10 minute sets. Today I'll just do three, but ideally I want him doing four each day. This show made me realize further that he needs to be even MORE fit! When he's done with this schedule (in four weeks right before the Grand Prix), he'll be up to almost 1 full hour of trotting and cantering not including breaks. Yikes.

On to the pictures!! Once again my computer is questionable with its display so they're probably a lot more vibrant than I wanted them to be, but I make no claims to be a professional photographer. COLORS!

I'm nervous! Rico couldn't care less

Up centerline

He's so much more forward now!

Medium trot! My shadbelly wanted to all be on the right side... ugh

Half pass, look who's sitting straighter??

Extended canter

Coming into the right pirouette, note the
fear in our eyes

After the ones, almost done!

Final passage on centerline

SO happy to be done, SO HAPPY

I'm still feeling really great about this show, but the pressure for the Grand Prix in LESS THAN A MONTH is starting to set in. And it's manifesting itself in different ways.

For example, you should have seen the ridiculously long email I sent to my boyfriend today about camping dates. It was crazy. Boyfriend just responds with "whatever you want" and "you pick," he's a keeper... and is in for it for the next few months as we're comping at the highest level.

Future Grand Prix horse right here!
Who is now pawing because I'm taking too long :)