The value of schooling shows

The wild stallion himself.

First show of 2017 is in the books!

Little schooling shows are so valuable for a number of reasons. For example:

1. You get to wrestle through new tests and see exactly what places are going to slam you.

2. You find out that somehow, over the winter, you calf got larger (was it the running or the cookie dough?). After spending 10 minutes cussing, sweating and pulling - you get your boot zipped. Only to have your ENTIRE LEG go numb during warm up.

3. You forget things. Like, your whip. So have to ride your kind of lazy horse through TWO fourth level tests with no whip.

4. You realize you need to run more.

5. But your horse is awesome.

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So the longer version!

Hamps and I just did a day trip to the Kentucky Horse Park on Saturday. Our classes were at the end of the day, so I got to take my time. It is such a stark contrast being at the KHP when it is pretty much empty, in caparison to, say, Rolex weekend. In fact I parked the rig right next to my stall. Super nice!

The only problem with this show, is that they rent the crappy covered arena and one crappy warm up. I swear these are the only two rings on the property with shit footing. Half of the outdoor was deep, wet sand that you couldn't even ride through. The second warmup is so small that it's difficult even for a Training level horse to warm up in, much less anyone else.

Show arena

But we did our best in any case. Hamps warmed up like a champ. He was attentive, sharp, forward and very very willing. He was in a really good mood! He seemed happy to be on an adventure!

Our first test, 4-1, was pretty good. I am a little rusty in the arena, and the footing was causing Hamp to trip some - so I did lose some engagement and push from behind in places. There were a few moments where he lost energy, too. But overall pretty good for our first test since July. The judge rewarded us with a nice 64+% ... including an 8 on the left trot half pass!!!! Who would have EVER thought?! Lots of 7s, some 6s and a few 5s where we really lost energy and engagement. She is known as a fair, but not overly generous judge so I was pleased!

Before our 4-3 test, I took a little stroll around the park. We snooped around the Rolex arena, and also over to the Hall of Champions where WGC Bono was out grazing. It was a lovely, sunny but cool day. I decided Hamp really didn't need another full warm up. He was being so good.

Bucket list: To show in the Rolex arena some day!

WGC Bono enjoying retirement in the hall of champions

So right before 4-3, I quickly schooled the piros and a couple of canter-halts for our centerline. I won't be doing that again, that was a mistake.

So the test started out great. We can nail the trot work. But once the canter tour started, I knew I might be in trouble. He was behind the leg from the start and there are several movements before you get to do an extended canter. He stopped dead during one of the counter canter 10m circles, stopped dead in BOTH piros, and by the time we got to the tempis, he was WAY behind the leg and downhill, so those were a hot mess of late changes. I must have muttered "fuuuuuck" under my breath 10 times. And with no whip to "tap tap HELLO!" him with .... I had to flat out pony club kick him a couple of times. Because half halts don't work unless you have energy to back it up with!  At least I didn't freeze and hope things got better. (my usual reaction)

Not sure if we were supposed to be over here ....

So yeah, we rode the struggle bus in 4-3. But our good moments were really good, and we still scraped up a 60.7% for our first, rather ugly, attempt at this very difficult test. I suspect he was just starting to get tired and I really wasn't much help. He otherwise was very obedient. I think the stopping was a result of my schooling canter-halts too much in the warmup. So we had some miscommunication there.

Walking back to the barns.

Overall I am very very happy with our first outing of the year! I could not be more pleased with his attitude and willingness. We are just green at the level, and we have until the end of April to make things better for our rated debut.

Plus, once I can nail 4-3 .... out comes the shadbelly.