The second half of the day on Saturday was spent judging the Prelim divisions. I got the opportunity to judge the skinny one stride combo called "the Palisades". I had seen both Melissa and Marcy school through this before and knew that for an inexperienced horse or rider, this could be tricky. You really have to get a compressed bouncy canter to it with good impulsion. And it's skinny, so it could invite runouts. It was late in the course and was actually the last combination before the end, so I was expecting that maybe some horses would be tired and there might be some issues here.
Not. A. One. Seriously. What I learned watching this is that people only had trouble if they tried to adjust in the middle. If they had the right canter going in and just stayed out of their horse's way, the horse would figure out how to get out. There was one rider that got two strides because they didn't have the impulsion going into the first. But just one. It was pretty much the opportunity to sit back and watch a lesson over and over. By really good riders.
So be prepared. I was able to put my camera on burst and got pictures of everyone. I whittled it down, but there are still tons of pictures.
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| Jennie Brannigan on I Bella |
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| 241 Clayton Fredericks riding FE Subiaco |
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| 247 Sara Kozumplik Murphy on Sebastian |
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| 249 Jessica Pheonix on Bogue Sound |
Let's take a brief break from the picture spam and look at this series of pictures of Buck Davidson on Sleigh Ride. In particular, pay attention to his leg.
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| 271 Buck Davidson Summer Sleigh Ride |
Yeah, pretty amazing, right? Never moves. In any of the 17 jillion pictures I have taken of him. He did ride like 6 in Prelim alone or something. I guess that's what happens when you ride 30 horses a day. Anyway, back to the picture porn.
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| 275 Mrs. Lesley Grant-Law on Dassatt Laman |
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| 274 Mr. Leslie Law on Voltaire de Tre |
Sorry, the Leslie/Lesley Law thing always gets me. And when they are both on course at the same time, it causes confusion. Sometimes they are called Mr and Mrs, and sometimes "the female Lesley Law" and "the male Leslie Law". Thank goodness they are spelled differently. I can just imagine the confusion with mail in that house...
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| 273 Hannah Sue Burnett on Van Goettching |
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| 276 Maya Black on Mowgli |
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| 302 Buck Davidson on Lisseycasey Cougar |
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| 300 Allie Knowles on FE Crosby |
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| 293 Laine Ashker on Jolly Good Sport |
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| 292 Jennie Brannigan on Twilightslastgleam |
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| 328 Buck Davidson on Dutch Harbor |
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| 295 Hannah Sue Burnett on Cooley Dream |
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| 297 Jessica Pheonix on Maserati One |
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| 333 Leslie Law on Bounce |
And at the end of the division came one I was anxious to see. Elisa Wallace moved her mustang Hwin up to Prelim. So let's see how the little grey bombshell did with the distance...
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| 330 Elisa Wallace on Hwin |
The distance ran a bit long for her, giving her a longer spot on takeoff to the second, but they seemed to get through it fine. I like the way she slipped the reins so Hwin could make best use of herself to get over. This is a great little horse.
So there you go. Another show down. The next one is next weekend (Mar 4-6), and then we have a month break. I will only get to judge one day again this time, but the one in April, I will do both days, since Violet will be competing. We'll have to see how they are about letting me move around, because I want to see how she goes.
i <3 Hwin!! great pictures!! it's funny - i'm obvi nowhere near a prelim rider, but it actually doesn't surprise me that the combination rode so well. both my eventing coaches have been schooling me through one stride combos (both in the arena and on xc) for a long time now - so my horse really just gets them. plus the fences themselves, while narrow and a smidgen upright, seem pretty inviting for the horses. like you said, seems like if it's ridden straight and with a good canter, shouldn't be a problem
ReplyDeleteI've not done a lot of one strides, except in gymnastics. I just know that Melissa said that one was not easy. But the horses all seemed to figure it out when left alone.
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