The Art of the Unbothered

Hamp and I took a Friday evening off and decided to try our Grand Prix freestyle at the Kentucky Horse Park. Frankly, an opportunity to show in the Rolex arena should never be turned down. Haha.

Behaving at the trailer.

We had a relaxing afternoon getting ready. Got there in plenty of time. Human and horse were very relaxed. I had caffeine and food in my stomach. Absolutely an ideal lead-up to a show.

Hamp warmed up great, absolutely no problems. Weather was gorgeous.

Sprucing up the Porkchop

We went in the ring and ... just ... things went to shit.

Right out of the halt I do a canter half pass zig zag. MISSED THE CHANGE at the change of bend and was ummm half passing on the wrong lead? I guess that's what you call it? Just right off the bat nothing went right. Missed a bunch of ones, screwed up the twos on a circle. Passage way too trot like. 

I have no idea what happened. We got a generous 61%.

Of course I went back to the trailer and HATED MYSELF for about 20 minutes. Shouldn't be doing this. Definitely not good enough to go to Regionals. We don't belong at this level. Sloppy. Out of our scope. Absolutely shit test. I am wasting my money.

But then I remembered some advice I heard in Wisconsin.

"You have to not let it bother you."

I think this might be one of the most important characteristics of the top riders. Because they "fail" just as much as anyone. Except they keep going. They are unbothered by crappy tests and bad scores. Of course they go home and work on the weak points, but one has to remain unbothered.

I haven't quite mastered the art yet. But for now, we move forward!

Picture of Sylvester and Obi demonstrating how to be unbothered.