Author: ponydreamer

Alternative Show Jumping

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Yesterday I was jumping the ponies in the field but today I tried an alternative form of show jumping – I finally managed to take my dog to our first agility competition.

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The show ground is a bit overwhelming at first – it seems to just be a sea of jumps and other obstacles and it is only when you get closer that you can pick out the different rings.  They are separated by a single strand of string and as I have seen dogs in the past running amok, leaving their own ring and invading the others, I was more than a little nervous about our first runs.  I was not at all confident that the dog would listen to me!

Our first two classes were on first thing so we arrived bright and early to walk and try to remember two courses at once.  Luckily my years of showjumping stood me in good stead for that!

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More importantly though, the dog stayed beautifully focussed on me and although we didn’t quite get clear rounds (we had trouble with the weaves in both classes) we got round with very little trouble.  I could not have been more pleased with her.

The scoring system was amazing – as each dog finished, their score was immediately posted up on a tablet at the ringside.  You could see exactly how you did and keep track as the rest of the competitors went as well.  It was brilliant!

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We don’t have to do this with the horses!

We had a long wait until our next class so we watched some of the other dogs running before heading back to the car for lunch.  The dog was already very tired and couldn’t really keep her eyes open but every time a dog barked – which was often – she would jerk back awake again.  Poor dog.  At least she was resting.

Most of the rings had finished by the time we got to our last class so the show ground was getting quieter and less distracting.  I thought we might be in trouble though when the dog before us ran off with someone else’s treat box.  In fact my dog was right with me for most of the course – the only problem being the weaves (again – we need to work on those) when she decided she really had to stop for a scratch.  We got a cricket score in time faults but again I was so incredibly proud of her.

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Yes, I did nearly run into the fence myself!

Today went so much better than I thought it might and it has given me a lot of confidence for the next competition.  Hopefully I’ll remember that when the time comes!  The dog is currently fast asleep and looking like she might stay that way – these days are as hard work for her as they are for me!  Definitely worth it though.

A Horseless Horsey Day

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Today has been extremely busy for me.  I went to help my riding club team at the horse trials qualifier and it was a long but very fun day.

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I got to walk the cross country course with the team, then it was all hands on deck to tack up and get the first riders down to the dressage warm up.

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Once the first rider was finished with dressage I helped adjust their tack for jumping, then I became our team’s chief pole putter-upper in the warm up ring.  I spent several hours adjusting poles and getting rather sandy in the process.

I also got drenched – when I left the lorry it was blazing sunshine and I was worried about sunburn but before too long there was an almighty crack of tbunder and the heavens opened.  I was in the middle of the warm up at the time and had no chance to get my coat.

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By the time our last team member was finished show jumping most of the others had finished completely so once I’d helped her get ready for her cross country round it was time to start removing studs and getting the horses booted up and ready for the journey home.

I had a great day helping out and hopefully learned a lot too.  I managed not to fall asleep on the way home but I was definitely not the world’s greatest conversationalist!

Mechanical Horse Riding

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Yesterday I went to have a lesson on a mechanical horse.

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The riding club have organised several of these days but I have never before managed to get there so I was very excited to finally be able to have a go.  I was more than a little nervous as well though as I really didn’t know what to expect.

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I honestly do not know what I’m doing with my hands here. I can only assume I am describing something but I cannot remember what!

This particular mechanical horse is people powered so it is the rider using their weight correctly which makes the horse move in different gaits.  It’s incredibly clever and means that if you do something wrong you can really feel it because the horse stops what it should be doing.  At one point I was trying to get the horse to canter and instead managed to make it buck!

It was such a fun experience and extremely interesting too.  I learnt a lot about how to use my body more effectively in the saddle and got some useful pointers about my feet too – they always want to turn out!  Being sat on a mechanical horse rather than a real one means you can concentrate properly on how your body is working rather than on what the horse might be doing. I woud definitely recommend the experience if you get the chance.

Now I know how it should feel when I’m using it correctly – all I need to do is put it into practice when I’m riding the ponies!

Jumping Joys

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Now the weather is less rainy the fields have dried up beautifully.  Which of course means that we are able to school again.  Not only that – we can jump!

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It has been a good few months since the ponies have jumped so I like to start them off with pretty simple jumps and not rush into anything too big or complicated.  Galahad loves to jump though – he really comes alive when we get the jumps out.  In fact, he can get a bit too strong if I don’t watch it.  On Thursday I kept him to a strict trot over the fences for serveral minutes as I had felt he wasn’t really listening to me.

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We have had a lovely few sessions playing with the jumps and my sister has even been able to join us a couple of times which just adds to the fun.  For one thing, it means we can have a go at pairs jumping which can be hilarious.

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I am so much enjoying having the jumps out again!

Fly Season

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It seems that the fly season is upon us already.  We have had to fish the deosect out of the tack room and have sprayed the ponies.  Galahad hates fly spray so he didn’t enjoy it at all but at least deosect doesn’t need to be applied so often.

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The fly masks are back out as well.  It seems very peculiar to have Galahad’s rug on at the same time but it’s still pretty cold here at night and not warm enough to leave it off yet.  He is enjoying the time without it during the day though.

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Of course, all of this means that hunting for lost fly masks in odd corners of the field is once again a regular part of my life.  That’s how I’ll be spending the next few months!

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Birthday Breakfast

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What with all the excitement of Badminton last weekend, I never posted about the ponies’ birthday.

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Birthday treats

Since they are moor bred we don’t know when they were actually born so we gave them a shared official birthday on the first of May.  A May Day birthday seems lovely!

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‘We’re starving!’

They both had apples and carrots added to their breakfast and they seemed very keen to eat them – they both stood there whickering until they had the food.  In fact, they tried to storm the feed room and we had to move the dog out of the way before she got trampled.  Normally they just stand and beg from a distance.

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After work I watched the trot up at Badminton, then I was off out with the ponies again.  Galahad and I went for a hack in the evening sunshine which was just beautiful.  It’s what I would enjoy on my birthday – hopefully he did too!

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Badminton From the Sofa

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We used to go to Badminton every year but haven’t managed it for the past few.  However, Badminton weekend is still very special for us and we always make sure to watch as much of it as we can.

I so much appreciate the live stream on the Badminton website – I got to watch the first trot up after work on Wednesday and my breaks on Thursday and Friday were spent cooped up in the staff room with the dressage.  It never gets shown on television so it was wonderful to be able to watch it.  Oliver Townend’s record score made it extra exciting too!

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I rode both my own ponies on Saturday morning (listening to Radio Badminton as I did so!) before making my way inside to settle down for the cross country.  This is obviously the big draw of eventing and is always very exciting but this year I knew it would be even more so – the new dressage scoring meant that the scores were tight and time penalties were going to be very influential.

I thought Eric Winter’s cross country course was brilliant.  There were lots of difficult questions which caused problems for the riders without too many falls.  It was wonderful to watch and the riders seemed to like it as well – they were all commenting on how great the course was and that the going was perfect.  I was particularly taken with the Nyetimber Heights, Shogun Sports Hollow and Outlander PHEV Bank combinations which at first glance looked impossible but mostly rode very well.  It was a fantastic day of sport and I was glued to the television.

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This morning I was up bright and early to see to the ponies before the final trot up.  We always make ourselves the same picnic breakfast we would have had if we were actually at the event and it was a lovely, leisurely way to start our Sunday.  My sister came round to ride and, feeling inspired, we did some jumping of our own.  It wasn’t quite up to Badminton standard but we had fun!

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Today’s show jumping was nail biting, especially when we got to the final few riders.  I couldn’t decide who I wanted to win – I am a huge fan of both Piggy French and Oliver Townend.  I really wanted Piggy to win her first five star but for Oliver to claim the second leg of the Rolex Grand Slam would also be great.  Either way, I was thrilled with Piggy’s clear round – it meant we had a British winner.

Oliver Townend had one fence down but he could afford that as well as a couple of seconds over the time.  Even as he cleared the last fence we thought he had won – I think everyone did – but the clock ticked over just enough to drop him behind Piggy French.  I was so disappointed for him but absolutely delighted for Piggy.  She definitely deserved a win.

It has been a wonderful, if somewhat lazy, weekend.  It’s a shame it has to end!

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Spring Cleaning

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The ponies being away last week seemed like an excellent opportunity to get in some spring cleaning.  It was more than time for me to properly clean the rubber mats in the stables and the beautiful weather made it seem like an even better idea.

It was a difficult job getting the mats out of the stables – they are very heavy and the dog didn’t help by jumping all over them.

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Having got them all out but done no actual cleaning I then swanned off to a riding lesson leaving my sister with all the mucky work.

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I was not expecting her to finish the job but she worked incredibly hard and not only cleaned the underside of the mats themselves but scrubbed out the stables as well.

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All that was left for me to do was clean the other (less dirty) side of the mats, wait for everything to dry and put it all together again.  It was actually extremely satisfying to clean something which was so very dirty.  I could definitely see that I was making a difference!

The stables looked beautifully clean afterwards.  Of course, now the ponies are home again they are not quite so pristine but at least they won’t need such a thorough clean for a while.

Easter Bonnets

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Sorry for the lack of blog yesterday – I was rather caught up in the Easter festivities.  I sing in a church choir and we had five services over the past few days.  It is something I love to do but it did mean that by yesterday evening I was exhausted and completely failed to write anything.

It has been a glorious weekend here and the ponies are enjoying the spring grass very much.  The downside is that Galahad’s mane is once again filling with burrs most days and I spend most of my grooming time extracting them.  On the bright side, he did look very fetching in his Easter bonnet.

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We have been having a lovely weekend.  Normal service will be resumed next week.

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A Most Exciting Day

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Yesterday the ponies and I went to the riding club dressage competition.  This one was held at my instructor’s yard so we were wonderfully relaxed and at home.  It felt strange not to be going away to compete but it was fun to be involved in the set up.

Cookster and I did the Intro C dressage test.  We are not quite ready for a canter test yet – our steering can be dodgy and we often lack impulsion – but our walk and trot tests are definitely improving.

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He felt nice and responsive in the warm up and was actually going forward which was gratifying.  He was a little wobbly in the test itself  and very noisy – he kept calling for Galahad and the judge commented that we could have done with some music to go with his vocals!

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This was only our third test though and I was extremely pleased with how he went.  We ended up with a score of 63% and a fourth place so I was thrilled.

I had time for a quick cup of tea and then I had to get Galahad ready for the pairs class.  My sister couldn’t ride with me so I had recruited one of the children on the yard.  Our practices had definitely improved but we were not expecting much – for two ponies who live together they were not really working very well as a pair.  Galahad tried to bite Cookster more than once and Cookster was determined to play follow my leader instead of riding side by side.

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Having two ponies to compete is wonderful but it does keep you busy!

However, once we got into the arena I was pleasantly surprised.  There was no fighting at all and although we definitely lacked impulsion – I had to work very hard to keep Cookster up with Galahad – we were more or less together most of the time.  It certainly felt much better than any of the practices had done and was a lot of fun.

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Some of the other pairs had looked very good though so we were not really expecting to place very high.  However, at the prize giving our names kept not being called until there were only two pairs left.  I had picked the other pair as the winner and so I was convinced we would be called next.  We weren’t though which meant we had won the class with 68%.  We were both astonished but absolutely delighted.

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Cookster was very miffed he didn’t get to eat the Easter egg!

After that excitement I had to calm down to take Galahad in for the Prelim 13 test.  I had never done that one before but I really like the way it flows.  Galahad felt great warming up but by this point I was freezing – it was a beautiful day but the wind was icy.

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I kept my coat on as long as I possibly could!

The test felt pretty good and not rushed as it can do sometimes.  Most important for me though was that we got the correct canter lead on the right rein.  That is a major achievement for us and meant that no matter the result it was a successful test for me.  In fact, we came fourth with 66% and were the best of the senior competitors.  It was a very successful day for the junior riders!

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Once the ponies were away I had to rush and write for the judge.  It’s a job I find very interesting and it is possible to learn a lot from hearing all the comments as the tests are ridden.  I also found it fascinating watching the novice tests as I could see that some of the movements were very similar to the ones we had done in the prelim test but just slightly more advanced.  It shows how we need to be working to improve.

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‘We’ve been working hard all day – where’s our dinner?’

I had the most wonderful day and was so proud of both ponies – they really did work hard.

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