There's so much to catch up on that it's hard to know where to start! First, Iggy is now a show horse. He attended a schooling show at Horse On Course. He was very well behaved in frigid temperatures. His back was tight, so our canter was a mess. However, he was brave and pleasant, so I chalked it up as a win! (And he did win his Training 2 class even with his mistakes.)
We then attended our first recognized show at Morven Park in Leesburg, Virginia the following weekend. It's a beautiful facility and we had a great weekend with friends. Iggy settled into the show grounds eating and drinking perfectly. He seemed to like the busy show atmosphere as a spectator, but the warm up arena had his little mind spinning. We don's ride with other horses at my quiet boarding barn very often, so the busy atmosphere was a lot for him to handle. He did well, but he took a distinct dislike to the cute draft cross and the upper level horse schooling with us. They were worthy of some whirling and spinning to avoid getting too close.
After surviving the warm-up, Iggy was spent and did not think it was necessary to actually enter the show ring. After some strong encouragement, he finally trotted around the ring and we rode our test. There were lots of schooling moments, and our canter to the left was tight and had some swaps behind to the off lead. Given how well he has been going at home, I think it's combination of tightness in his back and weakness that made the canter such a mess at the show.
Even with all of the mistakes, he managed to score a 69% on Saturday in Training 2 and second place out of a large open class. Sunday we did not fare as well and we came in dead last in training 3 with a 59%. It was well deserved as we had all kinds of changes - including a clean flying change over x -- exactly where we should have trotted. Although I was a bit disappointed that his canter was so unbalanced, I was very pleased with his overall attitude and behavior. I think with time and experience, he is going to be so much fun!
After the show at Morven Park, I spent the next week going back to the drawing board. I decided to ride him completely in half seat and with his neck very low and low in all three gaits. He felt great and I could feel him using his whole body correctly. We have now been using this very long and low feel for our warm up in all three gaits, and then I gradually work through transitions until he allows me to put him together and have more contact on the reins. At home and at clinics, this is working well. But I'm still not sure we are ready for another horse show. We'll give this new method some time.
We then attended our first recognized show at Morven Park in Leesburg, Virginia the following weekend. It's a beautiful facility and we had a great weekend with friends. Iggy settled into the show grounds eating and drinking perfectly. He seemed to like the busy show atmosphere as a spectator, but the warm up arena had his little mind spinning. We don's ride with other horses at my quiet boarding barn very often, so the busy atmosphere was a lot for him to handle. He did well, but he took a distinct dislike to the cute draft cross and the upper level horse schooling with us. They were worthy of some whirling and spinning to avoid getting too close.
After surviving the warm-up, Iggy was spent and did not think it was necessary to actually enter the show ring. After some strong encouragement, he finally trotted around the ring and we rode our test. There were lots of schooling moments, and our canter to the left was tight and had some swaps behind to the off lead. Given how well he has been going at home, I think it's combination of tightness in his back and weakness that made the canter such a mess at the show.
Even with all of the mistakes, he managed to score a 69% on Saturday in Training 2 and second place out of a large open class. Sunday we did not fare as well and we came in dead last in training 3 with a 59%. It was well deserved as we had all kinds of changes - including a clean flying change over x -- exactly where we should have trotted. Although I was a bit disappointed that his canter was so unbalanced, I was very pleased with his overall attitude and behavior. I think with time and experience, he is going to be so much fun!
After the show at Morven Park, I spent the next week going back to the drawing board. I decided to ride him completely in half seat and with his neck very low and low in all three gaits. He felt great and I could feel him using his whole body correctly. We have now been using this very long and low feel for our warm up in all three gaits, and then I gradually work through transitions until he allows me to put him together and have more contact on the reins. At home and at clinics, this is working well. But I'm still not sure we are ready for another horse show. We'll give this new method some time.
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