tbird - Pro Days

If I happened to intrigue you with my (very) general summary of the show - then I hope that I can remember enough details to make these more specific posts worthwhile..

I didn't get up to the show for Windsy's first day of Low Hunter rounds.  The plan was to show him in a 3' round, which was in the ring the Pre-Greens (and my divisions) would run in, as well as a 3'3" round in a different ring, but to see how the height felt.

Apparently in his first 3' round, Winds jumped the crap out of fence one - and was cantering boldly down to fence two when he slammed on the brakes for no apparent reason.  He jumped the rest of the course fine - but the stop was out of character so a second round at 3' was added. 

He must have jumped around nicely, because he pulled down a 2nd place in a big, open class.

Then he moved over to the other ring (where we wouldn't be showing) to pop around at 3'3" and laid down a nice trip, but swapped off his lead while he looked at something outside the ring, which kept him out of the ribbons in the 45 horse class.

I zoomed up to the show grounds early on Wednesday so I would be sure to catch his trips.  Which I did - but I forgot my camera.  So... that sorta sucked.

But it looked like this

Our barn had two horses showing in the 3'3" PGs so I actually got to see a majority of the division go which was educational, and a bit intimidating as I watched lovely round, after lovely round go by. 

I had to remind myself that lots of these barns put in at least half a circuit at Thermal and have had 3-4 weeks of additional shows since then.  Where as we had two lovely weeks in CA, but those were instead of our "normal" spring shows, not really a pre-season warmup...

But, both our horses were lovely and Windsy managed a 2nd and 3rd, while our barnmate won the second class.

Then I got dressed so I would be ready for the Under Saddle, which is about when I remembered that in Canada they jog the Pre-Greens. I have literally not spent one minute working with Winds in hand, so I wasn't too sure how it would go.  He was baffled as to why we were jogging back into the ring, but he was a decent sport, if a bit lazy. 

The Under Saddle was uneventful - as they tend to be.  But I managed to nearly pick up the wrong lead to the left and spent about 6 strides trying to re organize and strike off.   Either the judge didn't see us - or he didn't care, because we managed a 5th in a class where I was pretty sure we wouldn't ribbon (why do they only ribbon to 6th up here?).

Winds then decided to eat his bandages overnight, which led to a very grumpy purchase of new wraps as well as a Likit holder so that he could amuse himself with something more appropriate. He made his way through nearly the entire thing before his classes in the afternoon - but all wraps were left intact so I consider it a worthwhile investment. 

The temp also dropped a ton overnight and even through the monsoon's hadn't set in yet, I was literally wearing every layer I had packed in an attempt to stay warm.

also coffee. all the coffee.

I did actually remember to keep my phone in my pocket on Thursday, so you can all ooh and ahh over the lovely boringness of a beautiful Hunter round filmed poorly on a phone.  Winds nailed his first round with an 87 and won it.  Even with a conservative 10 strides in the bending line. 

Everyone was squishing in 10. So it was disappointing when in the second round, N laid down a gorgeous trip and a beautiful 9 in the bending, only to have a rail dropped in the judge's line (dang it!). 



I didn't even notice the rail while I was filming, so I was totally confused when they announced a score of 46.  Dropped us out of ribbons in that class, and meant that we missed champion by 3 points. I'd be more disappointed if I wasn't so freaking thrilled with how Windsy jumped.

We were presented with our (absurdly large) ribbon for Reserve and took all the prom pictures we could. 

This ribbon is legit taller than my toddler.

Overall it was awesome to feel like the move up to 3'3" was really easy for Winds.  We knew scope wouldn't be an issue, but having him stay soft and relaxed is a big victory - as is getting up the lines and cleaning up our changes.

I think we'll probably hold him in the 3'3" PGs for the rest of the season.  No real reason to move up and I think he can get some great mileage in the ring without beating up his legs too much.

As the rain set in I was getting extremely excited about stepping back into the ring myself and Friday would bring my Eq division with two rounds over fences and a flat.....