Photo shoot

A couple of weeks ago I pulled Kat out and lunged him. He still needs to be in shape for when we start working again, but for now he is getting turned out and/or lunged. When we start back at it, I will be ground driving him for a while to get him back into shape but also to fix some things, teach him some new stuff and get it right before putting him back between the shafts.  For now though I give you a few parting shots of him and how he is doing. 

Cruising along






Stop? You want me to stop???




Yes I cut his butt off. That's what you get using one hand to work the cell phone camera and the other to work your horse. I love his shoulder in this one though


My new fave photo of Little Man

Down time

While Kat is enjoying his time off, I have been riding my WB mare and getting her going under saddle. She was ridden as a 3y/o at a clinic and been a broodie for the most part since. Bringing a 13y/o mare along is fun, has it's challenges and also the same rewards of any age horse really.

I am posting about it on my other blog- The Well Groomed Horse  Join us in the journey from broodie to show horse as I prepare her to finally go in the ring under saddle...

Refresher course

Since Kat has had the last two weeks off and then a twist in a string of events kept me from riding my mare on Sunday, I pulled him out and decided to drive. We would just tootle around the pasture, nothing big, just an easy workout. I went with the snaffle and figured we would work on walking, bending and just keeping things relaxed for the most part.

Kat was his normal, calm and quiet self while I brushed him off and he did try slipping under the rail once or twice before I harnessed up. I almost forgot to put his boots on, but grabbed them and slipped them on, put him to and we were ready to go. I climbed into the cart; we went out back and started walking. We did some big circles, smaller circles, serpentines, stopped and walked off a few times and everything was good so we headed out into the big pasture with the cows. Yes we drive in the pasture with the neighbor’s cows and Betsy. We give them room and everyone is good.

Best laid plans, good intentions and all those happy thoughts went right out the window as soon as I asked for a trot. Kat was walking nice enough, but now that we were trotting he wanted to speed up and even canter. Um, NO! I had to bring him back down to a walk and then ask for a trot again and he was still fussing in the bridle and being a little twit. I couldn't just let him run and blow off steam, but I also couldn't get after him too much either for having that extra steam.

We trotted circles, we made a somewhat cloverleaf pattern in the pasture and we trotted down the centerline. There were a lot of change of direction and asking for bend, then change again and go back to bending the other way. Before long, Kat kept offering to stop. He was quitting on me, but if I tried letting up on the reins he tried taking off again and would speed up.

From here it will be back to ground driving and long line work in the snaffle again. Let him work out his own issues without the interference of the cart shafts, me and anything else anyone can think of to blame it on. Another part of the issue is that he is a stallion, it is spring and the mares are all in heat or will be. Expecting him to focus - he should be able to, but there are still times that nature takes over and he has his mind on other things. I'm not excusing his behavior for this, but rather pointing it out to keep it in mind that this is why he may not be responding like he should. If it gets in the way too much, too often- I don't have a problem calling the vet out to take care of that. Good stallions often make awesome geldings.

All said and done

This part of the CDE is not something I have shared with very many people yet. It was beyond awesome and with all things considered leading up to the CDE and the whole weekend in general- I was beyond thrilled for things to end on such a high note.

I have a lot into this- time, effort, (not so much on the blood, but...) sweat and tears, talking to people and asking questions on how to improve- several DUH! & A-HA! moments along the way, money, travel, etc. and things are not only looking up, but it seems they are about to get a whole lot better... and more challenging, possibly difficult and more than likely tougher at times too.

As the names were called and we each drove forward to accept our ribbons, the gentleman handing them out asked if Kat was a Welsh or at least a cross. When I answered that he is, he told me he thought so, "because typical of the Welsh attitude- Kat had something to say about everything".  He also told me he thought he was a very nice pony and he enjoyed watching our performance in the cones.

I talked to Gary later on back at the barn and was quite thrilled with what I heard. He told me- "Keep working with him and move up to Prelim. He is ready for it and so are you. Besides, the times in the hazards would count, you would be doing the water hazard- you are obviously ready for that-  Move him up."  I am pretty sure I had a huge, stupid looking grin on my face about then. Wow. Okay then...

Later as I helped my friend put her horse to the cart for her cones performance, she too told me to move him up. I told her that Gary had just said the same thing and she said "He's right. You guys are ready for it. He is a lovely pony and has such beautiful movement and he will just get even better." Now I had two well respected opinions and 'votes' to move him up to Prelim.  

After returning to the barn to gather things up, then walking over to the tent area- which was still covered in mud and slippery, sloppy and buzzing with people... I ran into another club member Jim. He is our course designer and judge for the cones portion of the ADT's and he also helps out with the hazards at the events. He is/was an approved ADS judge and a very knowledgeable horseman as well as driver. "My friends and I were seated in the tent and talking about how much we like your pony and how nice he looks in harness." 

That not only blew me away, but it had my mind racing wildly for a minute or two before I could find the words to thank him and let him know how much it meant to me to hear him say that. I'm not sure who his friends were, but knowing Jim, they too were likely well respected and knowledgeable drivers.

I had such a great time at the event, playing in the mud with both the truck and the pony/cart, then to have moved up from 4th to 3rd, posting a quick time in cones going double clear and getting not just one, but three compliments on everything... Yes at one point I was literally jumping up and down playing in the mud like a little kid.  It has been an adventure and the adventure is far from being over.

We will be moving up to Prelim, but for the most part- Kat is getting the summer off. I will still be working him and driving him, posting pics of him when I can, so don't worry about that. The two upcoming ADT's are about 2 1/2 hours away (one south- the other north) so we will be skipping them both. The last two ADT's to finish out the year- Paulden in the fall and Dale Creek in November- we will stay at training level while working on getting things right for the switch next year.

If we make the Grass Ridge CDE in October, I will look long and hard at how he is doing before sending our entries in. Worst case? We tank miserably in dressage and knock it out in the marathon and cones, maybe moving up a placing or two...  or 'E' out altogether with a big donation to the club and ADS. Who knows where it will go, but at least we will give it a shot and do our best.

Cones

With cones on the last day, they run the order of entries from last place to first. By moving up one placing in the standings we were scheduled to go right in the middle and then after that you wait around and they bring all of the training level entries (VSE, pony, horse, pairs, etc.) back into the ring to hand out the ribbons.

Our warm up was done out in the muddy area and the vet check- OTM (on the move) was done in the squishy, rutted grass of the holding area. Because the footing was so bad in there, I wasn't pushing him to do much more than expected and even at that, our circles were not all that great. He was sound though and there was no stiffness or soreness from his effort the day before so we were good to go. Watching the one gentleman in our class- he took a slightly different route in the cones and I believe he might have been the fastest on the course for the day. He did it in 3:24 with no time penalties, no balls down.

When it was our turn, Kat and I went in and knocked it out. There were a few places that the grass was deeply rutted crossing our intended route and again, Kat became a jumper as well as a driving pony and bounced his way around the course. He tried a few times to break into a canter and quickly brought it back down with a few words of discouragement from me. That could wait until we were done and he knows it. As usual we flew thru the cones and it was over before you know it. We flashed through the finish line and Kat loped towards the gate out of the arena. He had been whinnying his way through the course, but it wasn't as much or as loudly as he had done in dressage. For our efforts, we were double clear- no balls down, no time penalties.

Standing around waiting for the rest of the training level ponies, then horses to go, Kat was getting antsy. He wanted to do something. I took him out back to the warm up area and let him run. He made several laps going one direction, then several more going the other direction... As long as he didn't get too racy or stupid on me, he could keep going. He wasn't tired or worn out, but he was a lot more relaxed when I slowed him down to the trot again. Little man has got some serious staying power, since most of the other ponies and horses were happy to be standing around and resting for the most part.

Later I checked the scores and we were 2nd fastest for training level, single pony in the cones. We had done it in 3:44. The other times in our division were 3:47, 3:48 and 4:00. We had locked in our 3rd place position overall.

And on the 3rd day

After the marathon portion on Saturday I had to hose everything down. Silly me, I unhooked Kat and after removing the harness- took him over to hose him off. Then I took the cart over to hose it off and afterwards wiped down the harness to get the mud off of it too.  I should have just hosed it all off at once. It would have been much easier.

Sunday morning was fun getting the horse trailer in with all of the mud. The two main driveways were nice and firm with good traction, but getting from one to the other was the issue. I had it in 4WD and gunned it, holding my foot steady and not letting up for nothin'. The biggest mistake a lot of people made was going too slow and then stopping and then of course they were stuck. As it was- I did manage to slide my truck sideways a bit throwing mud all over the front of the trailer on the way in. As it was sliding, I held my foot steady on the gas pedal and was laughing out loud having a blast. This was not the first time I have been mud boggin' at a horse show!

I pulled around and backed the trailer in next to a friend of mine and her rig. It turned out later in the day, she would be helping me hitch up and I would be helping her. This was what I remember of horse shows from the past- people helping each other out, everyone there to do their best and most of all to have FUN!  Since things were still a bit muddy, some allowances were made as far as 'proper attire' in the ring. I wasn't going to wear my muck boots in the ring, but I wouldn't be wearing my nice shoes either. I was going with my boots...

I had started to make a new coat for this event and when things didn't come together like they should, I scrapped the idea and went with the hat, coat and apron I had made for Grass Ridge last fall. Thursday night after dropping off Kat, I had to rush home and finish a skirt to go with it all.  I had thought about buying a pair of slacks, but decided matching the colors would be a challenge and look ridiculous without the apron so I went with making the skirt.

When it came time to get ready for cones, I harnessed Kat at the trailer, then climbed inside to change clothes. The look for in the ring was one thing. I had on the hat, the coat, my tank top underneath my skirt, my tall socks and my boots. I put my apron on and tucked it up into the waistband with my gloves. I was ready to put Kat to the cart and go.

My friend had asked about me putting the apron on before putting Kat to the cart. Wouldn't it drag in the dirt? When I tucked it up, she had never thought of that before. This was kind of funny to me since she is a pleasure driving judge and competes at the advanced level. She did give me a tip on the decoration of my hat- tuck up the ends of the tulling on the bow. Having it flowing out behind me was distracting. Like in hunters and dressage- clean lines make for fewer distractions on the judges eye.  Since today was cones, it could pass, but in the dressage or pleasure class rings- no!

To be continued...

Marathon- Section E

The third stage of the marathon is Section E and has the hazards. This is where the fun begins!  One thing that stuck in my mind from last year was to take my time and do things right. Slow and right beats fast and wrong, all the time, every time.  Last year since it was my first CDE, I can admit that I got caught up in the excitement of being there, being in the moment and letting Kat go as fast as he wanted without breaking out of a trot. Doing that cost us big in the end.

Last year I was in 3rd after dressage and slipped to 4th because of my mistakes in Section E of the marathon. I seriously think they call it Section E, because if you are going to E out or get Eliminated- that is where it is likely to happen. Missed gates, red on the right, several obstacles to remember your path through and even with a good 'gator- it still happens and not just at Training Level.

As a quick recap from last year- I let Kat go too fast and in Hazard #2 we overshot one way into the maze, took the next one- which happened to be Gate C and rearranged the alphabet that day. That cost us 20 penalty points. **Something to note here- in training level, your time IN the hazards doesn't count**  Then at the end, Kat was cruising along in a really nice extended trot so I let him. I figured we would finish strong doing a bold, very forward trot. Another big mistake since we finished 34 seconds Under the minimum time allowed. We were too fast and racked up More penalty points... Doh!

So this year I had my plan of action in mind. I had walked the course three times already and although the first time out I mistakenly went through the hazards in the wrong the wrong order. I walked through #1, #2, #5, then #3 and finally #7 instead of taking them in the correct order. At least while I was walking them- I realized what happened and retraced the course in my mind so I knew what I was supposed to do.  Mind you this was on Friday afternoon. The wind was blowing at around 65mph at times, it was raining off and on and twice we had decent sized hail. This is all supposed to be FUN! Remember???

**#4 is the water hazard. ADS rules state there is to be an optional dry route for training level, but since this one is set up in a way that a dry route is not possible- training level skips it. Training level also only has 5 Hazards so #6 was skipped as well. It consists of 2 large 'covered wagons' and Gate B was going right through the one wagon**

As Kat and I made our way out to the start of Section E, he didn't have a care in the world about the same people who were the scary, horse eating monsters that we had to go past to get to the start of Section A. He was ready for action, but this time around, these people were fine and not going to bother him, let alone set him off like they had earlier that morning.  We walked around in the waiting area as the pony before us was also waiting for their turn to go.

We are spaced out in 5 minute increments so that there is a steady flow through the hazards and everyone has plenty of time to do things right, make corrections and be on their way before the next competitor comes through. This also gives the many volunteers at each hazard time to consult and call in any penalties to the TD and Ground Jury. With so many people armed with camera's and video cameras- if there is any question about anything- someone along the sidelines probably has it on hand for a quick review and is more than happy to provide digital evidence of what you actually did.

Kat and I finally had our turn and we headed off to complete the rest of our course.  He was comfortable moving along at a steady working trot. We headed off to Hazard #1 the Kokopelli Pipes.  Some of you may have seen photos of us in the pipes as we had done them at the Darby back in December.

To get to the Pipes, you have to enter a fenced area and right in the gateway was a sizeable spot of mud. No problem here- Kat just launched his little bad self into the air and jumped it. The mud was pretty firmly packed, but he didn't care and wasn't going to set foot on it and find out otherwise.  There was plenty of photographers on the sidelines and I am hoping that someone caught that, because I was cracking up and I heard several others laughing about it as well. He never fails to surprise, impress, amuse or entertain if given the chance.

We wound our way around and through Gates A, B and C, thanked everyone as we went through the Out gate and headed out the way we came in. Kat jumped the mud again and kept on going like it was no big deal or anything out of the ordinary. Everyone had another good laugh about it and it was all good. We wound our way around and through the course, went through Hazards #2 & #3, looped around through the fields and I could see that we were gaining fast on the horse in front of us. This kind of had me concerned. Either we were going way too fast, they were going too slow or a combination of both was happening and we were both going to get nailed on it later.

I slowed Kat down a bit as we were approaching and lined up for Hazard #5 to let them get out of there before we came blasting along.  We headed into #5 and easily wound our way around through the gates and I made sure the red was always on my right as we went through them.

As we came out of #5 we were stopped and advised that the course had changed.  Where we should have gone straight and wound our way around through a field- others had gone through it in the morning and their horses struggled as the horses and carts sank into the deep mud.  One woman's horse, a lovely Trakehner mare sank to her knees in the mud while the cart sank to the axles. There was nowhere to go but forward. They were on the path through the field, so getting off the path meant the mud may be deeper yet. One of the minis or VSE entries- the driver had to get off the cart and lead her horse out to solid ground. She was advised she would not be penalized for it and after that- that section of the course was closed.

After coming off of #5, we took a right to the end of the road, made a left and went up that road to a 'marker' which was a person waiting to tell us to make a U-turn and come back, that we would be back on course from there and proceed as normal, which was go to hazard #7. At Hazard #7 we went in the In gate, made our U-turn and back out through the Out gate heading for the end of section E.

Once you cross through the markers at the end of Section E, you head back over again to the vet check and rest area. The vet gives you a quick once over- respiratory and HR, quick look to see that the horse is ok and then you are met by the President of the Jury. You hand him your green time card and he figures your times for each section and scores.

On Section A with 23-25 minutes as the time allowed? Our time was 23:03. We BARELY squeaked by on that one without penalties by 3 seconds. Talk about cutting it close!  In the walk portion- Section D the maximum time was 12 minutes and we came in at around 9 or 10 minutes I believe.  Now for the scary part. I have no idea how we did in Section E and he didn't either. It looked like we were once again fast, but since the route was changed, the one hazard withdrawn- they really couldn't figure times on the course at that point and would have to make the changes and accommodations later and then refigure the scores.

As it turned out- because of all of the changes, the overall time for Section E for all levels was tossed out. Only the time in the hazards for the upper levels would count as well as any penalties or major mistakes which resulted in elimination.  While one person in Training Single Pony did have time penalties in Section A of the marathon- None of us E'ed out!  This penalty for the other competitor moved us up into third place. 

After shaking hands with the President of the Jury and thanking him for his time and comments, I headed Kat back towards the barns. He still had plenty of pep and plenty of breakfast to finish cleaning up. I had plenty of mud to clean up and clean off of everything. As we made our way back behind the tent and past the giant orange semi of Gerard Paagman- Ideal Harness it was a soupy, wet and incredibly sloppy mess. So I let Kat run... 

And run he did! Mud was literally spraying up off the wheels on the cart as well as it splashing up through the steel mesh of the basket as it came off his feet. We were both having a wicked blast and I soon realized I had better stop smiling because there was plenty of mud getting all over me and in my face. Yes I had mud in my teeth and Kat probably did too. At that point neither of us cared. We were having a total blast...

And this is the muddy, messy result-

My boots


My helmet on the seat of the truck




Mud chunks on the seat


A couple of chunks in the basket still and the number holder pulled double duty holding my green time card for each section.


More mud


You can see where I sat the whole time- it's clean!


The back of my number holder on the tailgate. It's caked!