OMG - A contest!!

Have I mentioned how much I love Noble Outfitters products??
So, how can I resist entering this fabulous contest put on by A Gift Horse?


Check out her review and contest details HERE: https://agifthorse.wordpress.com/2016/02/19/noble-outfitters-review-and-giveaway/


It's the littlest things, isn't it?

Concurrent Goals - Something's Gotta Give

If you've been following me for any amount of time, you are likely aware that I have several goals to pursue at any given time - and they may not all be horse related!!




I've been a little slow about getting my blogs posted since Arabian Sport Horse Nationals, and I've been feeling a bit guilty about that.  It leaves me feeling...  maybe... a little bit... like a failure?




Look.  I know I'm not a failure.
Just in case you didn't already know that about me. :D

NOT a failure!

We all have 24 hours in a day.

168 hours in a week.

And I have not been spending as much of it on this blog as I had been...

And that is because I have been focusing on my business.

That's right - I have a business!

You can explore my business blog at Dynamic with JacQ

You'll find some pony adventures over there, too.






NEVER FEAR! I will continue this blog, as well!
It just might be a tad longer between posts than you may have grown accustomed to.


When you are pursuing concurrent goals that are not directly related, it's going to take a little longer to reach them than if you focused ALL of your time on just one of them.


I'm still seeking that time balance that lets me work, ride, and write, but I look forward to having you along on the journey!

Dressage Clinic with Natalie Hinnemann

When we trailer more than a couple hours, the Fancy Pony gets stiff in the neck.  In fact, you can feel how the lower neck muscles get hard and knotted...

It took a while for this to make itself clear to me.

And, finally, I understood another piece of the puzzle that was missing...

How do you work through that sort of knotted mess once you get to the show?

So, I trailered 6 hours away to attend a clinic...
Fancy Pony wasn't the only Arabian there, but I'm pretty sure she was THE smallest mount...
And, of course, everyone cooed over her innate adorableness!

As expected, the Fancy Pony arrived tight and stiff in the neck and she was not her usual, soft self.  The head tossing reappeared.  The shoulder throwing was back.  And I had coaching to teach me how to work through it!

It was a beautiful day in South Dakota!

I warmed up and then walked the perimeter of the ring as I listened to Natalie Hinnemann finish up with the rider before me.

I liked her coaching style immediately.  It was focused, but her voice was soft and soothing - as if she was actually doing the riding rather than just coaching from the middle of the ring...


Whisper cooperated by producing all of the inconsistencies that I wanted to address.  All of those inconsistencies boiled down to connection and "thoroughness".  I had figured that part out, but I couldn't seem to work through it on our less spectacular days...


Natalie started by just watching us ride, then brought us onto a 20 meter circle.
The lesson was pretty basic, but the concepts were so vital!
It felt like we were riding our 20 meter circle with 10 meter bend.  Natalie constantly reminded me to bring Whisper's shoulders inside the circle.  Basically, we were riding circle in shoulder-in.  Then we would carry on to the corner and do the same in a 10 meter circle.
We would work the circle until Whisper softened into the contact and filled my outside rein, then we would ride to the next corner in shoulder-in, then ride the circle again.  We lived in shoulder-in.
Then, we would carry on down the straight line and add a touch of brilliance!  And I could FEEL how fancy the princess is!

Natalie poses with us for a picture during a walk break!

We moved on a little.  We continued to live in shoulder-in, but we added leg yield to the mix.  By living in shoulder-in, I was gaining more control over all 4 quadrants of Whisper's body.

We maintained shoulder-in through transitions. And, wouldn't you know, by focusing on maintain the positioning through the transition, I found us making those transitions in slow motion!

With lots of help, we started working through our biggest block, and I'm excited to move forward to the next one!

I had a dream a while back that I was riding Whisper down the long side in shoulder-in, then easy as pie, stepped into half-pass to the centerline.  I feel that reality is closer than ever!

You KNOW I'll be back to clinic with Natalie again!!

we schooled cross-country back in October...

And old demons were cake!
And new demons arose!  And it was all because of my own sucky riding!
cold snap, back pain, and lack of looseness in the rider...


Some of my favorite moments while schooling....




HEADED TO THE DOWN BANK
me:  Hey, we're cantering to the down bank!  Yay!
her:  I love cantering!  I love down banks!  I love cross country!
me:  Maybe we should trot before we get to that down bank.
her:  I love cantering!  I love down banks!  I love cross country!
me:  I insist we trot before that down bank.
her:  I love cantering!  I love down banks!  I love cross country!
me:  Hey, lady!  I said we're trotting!
her:  Nope.  We're going to canter that sucker!  I've got this! You just sit there and hang on!!
me:  Are you kidding me??
her:  Nope.  I've got this!
(arrive AT the down bank)
me:  *just riding through it*
her:  maybe I should have trotted? (inserts tiny stutter step) - Nope, never mind!  (landing) I've got this at the canter, too!




TAKING ON THE SCARIEST BENCH EVER (schooled BN last year, it was a fight to get over every single time)
me:  OK, here we go!  Own this bench!
her:  Oh, yeah!  I'm owning this!
(did she even bother to look at it?)
(coming around to take on the Novice version)
me:  *just riding any other jump*
her:  Bring it on!  I'm the baddest pony there ever was!  Look at me own this thing!




A HOUSE WE NEVER SUCCESSFULLY NEGOTIATED
me:  Yup, I know you've got this, because you find this sort of thing inviting.  Just riding!
her:  CHOMP-CHOMP-CHOMP! GIVE ME THE HOUSE!
me:  Ho there, lady!  Can you half halt a little?
her:  CHOMP-CHOMP! MINE!!
me:  Um - HELLO!  Running through my hands like this is completely unaccepta-----
her:  *runs through hands and charges over the house*
me:  .....well, I guess on the upside, we jumped it...  Now, about that rudeness!!




There was much larking over many other obstacles that just weren't a big deal.
There was a "flower box" that was OK at BN, but the Novice level just wasn't happening.
The water was, of course, a grand adventure, as always!  Snorkeling continues to happen.  I just think of it as stretching her back...


Yes. Snorkeling.
She shoves her face under the water up to her noseband and trots like that, dragging her face in the water!!
...I should really get pictures some day...

Arabian Sport Horse Nationals 2015 - Day 5: Training Level Dressage

The test itself was not the exciting part of this game...  It was, honestly, mediocre.  Not bad.  Just not spectacular.


Some local friends had come to cheer me on, and they were right there at the ring when I exited.
Another friend competing, went RIGHT after me, so I stayed to watch her test!
(That test is another story, and not mine to tell)




So, after all the excitement was done, we headed back to the barn.  And the volunteer stopped me on my way out to check my bit and any whip or spurs (which I didn't have).  It never occurred to me that she might be waiting...  She told me, "I was wondering when you were finally going to come over.  I watched to make sure you weren't wiping any blood off or anything!"  OOPS!




Of course, she totally understood me wanting to watch my friend's ride, and it wasn't like I had actually done anything wrong... But I felt like such a jerk!
I guess at Nationals, it's not random - EVERYONE gets checked!






*note*
I tried to upload some pictures, but technology hasn't been cooperating, so this one is going up media-free because I'm so tired of waiting to get it sorted out!!


More stories in the queue, plenty more opportunities for media...

Arabian Sport Horse Nationals 2015 - Day 4: Arabian Working Hunter 14.2 and Under, Arabian Sport Horse Under Saddle ATR, and Arabian Hunter Hack ATR

NOTE: I tried to round up media, but I guess it wasn't a good media day that day...
The getting all the words on "paper"...
I apologize if I was too verbose...  THIS is day 4.....

..................................................................................................................

This turned out to be the longest and least fun day at the show...


Of course, for every horse entered in Arabian Working Hunter 14.2 and Under, there were 2 courses, and usually a warm-up round.  I don't know how many horses were in the class, but it went on F O R E V E R!!


I decided the warm-up round wouldn't hurt us any, so I piloted the Fancy Pony around, unjudged, and she nailed every single lead on landing!!  It felt PERFECT!
There was some chaos around announcing and what was actually going on...
In order to keep things running smoothly, I came out after my warm up round to let another competitor get their warm up in.  Then, for the sake of time efficiency for everyone, decided to stay in the ring and ride my first and second judged rounds back-to-back.


I heard the ring attendant convey my information over to the powers that be, and I was told to go ahead and begin!
I picked up my canter circle, established a very steady, confident canter, and headed to my course!  I knew Whisper was going to go over everything without a glance, so I merely focused on landing our leads.  And we blew at least half of them...  I was able to get a couple trot lead changes, but in one corner, she thoroughly blew me off and refused to even consider changing.  Rather than have an ugly argument in the show ring, I decided to just counter-canter to the next line...  Compared to my warm-up round, it was appalling...  What did I do that messed us up??


Well, if you dwell on the line you just rode, you can't focus on the line ahead of you, so I promptly moved on to keeping my focus forward.
I finished my course, and came down to the walk until the judges were ready for my second round.
I was nodded on, and as I cleared the first fence, I heard the announcer tell the world that I was riding my first course.


REALLY?  I totally lost my groove.  Was I being judged as if I was riding my first course?  Because if I was, I was going to be marked on the WRONG course!  What am I supposed to do now?  I can't very well ask the judge as I ride down my line!
I don't know how long it took me to decide the only thing I could do was ride my second round like I owned it and just try to sort it out later, but I'm sure it didn't help my round while I worked through all the nonsense...


I think I landed on ONE correct lead...  It was as if Whisper thought it was a fun game to swap leads over every fence...  I'm really not sure what was going on.  It was probably just the pressure getting to me.  Knowing this one thing that really hurts our performance...  Focusing on it too hard...  Overthinking every move...


We were jogged in as reserve for our first round (that would NOT be reserve champion), and we weren't jogged at all for our second round.


We retacked and headed in for the flat, which I insisted was spectacular!
Well, we didn't make Top Ten...
I was sad, but not really surprised...

..................................................................................................................

We headed over to the main arena for Sport Horse Under Saddle ATR.  For the uninitiated, this is an Arabian breed invented class...  Walk-trot-canter on the rail, perhaps a lengthening each direction.  Shown in dressage or hunter tack.  I'm not sure any of us are actually sure what the judges are looking for...

There were 61 horses entered in the class, so we were riding in a section of 20-ish, and hoping to make the cut!

I went in and gave it everything I had!  I asked the Fancy Pony to be as fancy as she has ever been!

I felt like she was consistent, but she may have dropped behind my leg for all of a stride or 2...

As far as I was concerned it was a beautiful ride!

But, it wasn't my day, and we didn't make the cut.

Later, there was some discussion that 8 horses should have been moved forward from each cut, and only 6 were moved forward.  Regardless, we still wouldn't have made the cut...

THEN, it was going to be another half an hour before they started us up for Hunter Hack ATR.

So, we hoofed it back to the barn for a short rest...

..................................................................................................................

It was already feeling like a long day, and we'd spent most of it just standing around...
We ran another hunter hack class, but the competition was super stiff!
It ran just like the last hunter hack class.. you know - where we won a top ten??
Well, it wasn't in the cards this time, and we didn't make top honors.  I was still proud of all of our rides!  For crying out loud I WAS RIDING AT NATIONALS!!!
All we had to do was survive one more dressage test.......



Arabian Sport Horse Nationals 2015 - Day 3: Intro Jumper and Arabian Hunter Hack Open

I had to tie up my braids again, since the heinous beast raked some of them out the day before.

See?  Heinous beast...

So, I was up early to get things together.  Then, we waited for our class...

We actually had spectators for the jumper classes!!




The rules weren't very clear, so I chatted with another competitor to confirm the goal of my class...  This wasn't going to be "get around as fast as possible and clean"...
This was "get around clean and as close to optimum time as you can"!


So, I had 70 seconds to eat up around the course without going over.  I had a plan, but I wasn't exactly sure how it was going to play out...


I had planned all of my tiny turns to save time, but what if I was going too fast?


So, I considered where on the course I could look over my shoulder and check the timer...
And off we went!


Over jump 1, then a rollback to jump 2...  No hurry here.  We could have cut it so much tighter if I wanted to...


Around and back to get to 3 and 4... Maintaining a relaxing pace... leave out the shortcut...


Cruise over 5A and B....  quick turn to 6...
Peek at the clock on landing...

Still too fast....

Hop over 7, and take the long way around before jump 8....
Check the clock one last time...


Now, time to show off!
Hop over 8, then take the short route, spinning around the 5B element and diving between the jumps on my way to fence 9.  Not running, but lengthening the stride a little just to keep covering ground...
And we ended on 67.75 seconds!!




I couldn't get a copy of the video, but I encourage you to watch it here on the Rock Solid Arabians Facebook Page:


https://www.facebook.com/Rock-Solid-Arabians-113607098730787/videos/




Friends, we took first!
I still can't believe it!  We won!!


Whisper says she definitely loves the jumpers!!

Champion Intro Jumpers!

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

We played dress up and got some pictures taken.  I tried to update facebookland.  We must have rested back at the barn for a little bit, but I can't really remember....

Then, we went back for Hunter Hack Open.

The class felt BIG.  I was actually aware this time that my ride was streaming over the internet!

I tried to tune that out and just plain SHOW OFF!

We started with the usual walk/trot/canter around the ring.  You know something is going right when it's boring...  I mean, there really isn't much to say...  Quiet transitions, and get your leads - consistency throughout...

But, it's also the OPEN class.  I'm in the same class as Arabian Sport Horse Legend: ORATION++++//

BTW, those +'s and /'s are indicative of awards won from his show record.  He's kind of a big deal and pretty much wins every class he walks into...

WHAT was I THINKING??

We all lined up to take our turns over the 2 jumps in figure 8 style and hand-gallop to our halt...

My goal: clean, quite jumps and a distinguishable difference in hand-gallop...

The jumps were clean and quiet...  The hand-gallop felt distinguishable!  We halted a tad bit late, but I didn't have to fight for it.

I got back in line to await my fate...

I was busy chatting with my neighbors when they started announcing the Top Ten, so I was self interrupted by my shock when they called my number!!




Happy Birthday to ME!  We took National Top Ten in Hunter Hack Open!!

I followed the direction...