Post by racaille on Feb 24, 2016 8:23:20 GMT
The dressage judges at his latest complet really did not warm to Sam!
The T and another girl from our team decided to try a complet rather further away, three and a half hours actually, the other side of Montpellier. We decided to make a w/e of it so drove there on Saturday evening.The club is huge, posh and on the 3* circuit (Domaine des Trois Fontaines at Le Pouget if anyone is interested). The T and I booked into their gite (12€ a night and had a double room, cooking facilities, heating and good showers so a bit of a bargain. Although we lived on pizza ....
).
Sam was stabled and not happy. He tried to make friends with the pony in the next box who tried to bite him so he was pretty miserable.
Sunday dawned hot and our friends who had decided to do the trip in a day arrived in plenty of time with our coach, which was a minor miracle. Sam warmed up beautifully for the dressage, but as soon as he went into the arena away from the other horses he got stressed and tense. He did a pretty poor test, plus a big shy at something silly on one side and then a random leap before the final salute. WTF? The judges really disliked him - more than that they HATED him! Very poor marks, really severe: some 3s and nothing more than a couple of 6s for the stuff we thought he'd done rather well. Of course the T was stressed out by HIS stress which made matters worse and she got some pretty disappointing scores too.
So, lying 22nd out of 27 ... but onwards and upwards.
He was much happier afterwards and then did a double clear - some strange shapes in the SJ but he really enjoyed the XC. He is still very inexperienced at SJ but is getting much better at working it all out, his back end sometimes got a bit forgotten but all in all he is making great progress. He flew round the XC course, one small mistake jumping out of the water where he banged his legs but he was wearing super-duper new complet boots so no damage. Phew!
So they finished 12th overall. Not too shabby. We realised that as a racer he would have been boxed in all sorts of places but the stress he might have felt worked well to make him go fast but works against him when he is being asked to concentrate on dressage. He will have to get used to this and the T is working out strategies to help. It seemed that having to leave the other horses after the warm-up stressed him out most but really, experience will help him understand that it is only temporary. It was only his second Club 2 complet.
After a tiring day (I walked a million miles as groom!) we decided to stay on and drive back on Monday morning. After the really hot Sunday it was raining
but we got back in one piece, pretty tired but happy. The T has gained valuable points towards her qualification ....
I have some pix and will wrestle with uploading them.
The T and another girl from our team decided to try a complet rather further away, three and a half hours actually, the other side of Montpellier. We decided to make a w/e of it so drove there on Saturday evening.The club is huge, posh and on the 3* circuit (Domaine des Trois Fontaines at Le Pouget if anyone is interested). The T and I booked into their gite (12€ a night and had a double room, cooking facilities, heating and good showers so a bit of a bargain. Although we lived on pizza ....
).Sam was stabled and not happy. He tried to make friends with the pony in the next box who tried to bite him so he was pretty miserable.
Sunday dawned hot and our friends who had decided to do the trip in a day arrived in plenty of time with our coach, which was a minor miracle. Sam warmed up beautifully for the dressage, but as soon as he went into the arena away from the other horses he got stressed and tense. He did a pretty poor test, plus a big shy at something silly on one side and then a random leap before the final salute. WTF? The judges really disliked him - more than that they HATED him! Very poor marks, really severe: some 3s and nothing more than a couple of 6s for the stuff we thought he'd done rather well. Of course the T was stressed out by HIS stress which made matters worse and she got some pretty disappointing scores too.
So, lying 22nd out of 27 ... but onwards and upwards.
He was much happier afterwards and then did a double clear - some strange shapes in the SJ but he really enjoyed the XC. He is still very inexperienced at SJ but is getting much better at working it all out, his back end sometimes got a bit forgotten but all in all he is making great progress. He flew round the XC course, one small mistake jumping out of the water where he banged his legs but he was wearing super-duper new complet boots so no damage. Phew!
So they finished 12th overall. Not too shabby. We realised that as a racer he would have been boxed in all sorts of places but the stress he might have felt worked well to make him go fast but works against him when he is being asked to concentrate on dressage. He will have to get used to this and the T is working out strategies to help. It seemed that having to leave the other horses after the warm-up stressed him out most but really, experience will help him understand that it is only temporary. It was only his second Club 2 complet.
After a tiring day (I walked a million miles as groom!) we decided to stay on and drive back on Monday morning. After the really hot Sunday it was raining
but we got back in one piece, pretty tired but happy. The T has gained valuable points towards her qualification ....I have some pix and will wrestle with uploading them.
for so much hard work we thank ye!!
