After Margaret and I had such a fun time at the fall hunter pace, we opted to go again this spring! This time, while I rode Rejoice again, Margaret rode her horse Jester and had a friend ride Ladyhawke. All Kennebec Morgans!! Jester and Rejoice have the same dam and Jester and Lady share the same sire. Unfortunately instead of a lovely late spring day, we had one of the first intensely hot and humid days of the year. It was definitely a bummer, but the ride was mostly in the shade of the woods and we had a great time! most of the fences were 3' coops but we found a small log and this hay to jump haha Until we didn't. 😑 We brought along a third friend who rode Margaret's older mare, Ladyhawke. She's a good rider but hasn't known Ladyhawke for very long and didn't realize how much of a cranky boss mare she could be at times. She kicked Jester right in the front leg just about halfway through the ride, and while the cut itself ended up not being a big deal in the
While Reva took the month of July off from showing, Dreamy stepped up in her place! We entered an SMDA affiliated dressage show hosted by the SPHO-Maine on Sunday July 17.
I decided to ramp it up a little by entering Prix Caprilli, First 1, and First 2, as we had done back at the second SMDA show in June. Instead of raining, it was sweltering HOT. It was super hot, up into the 90s and they actually waived jackets. Phew!
We rocked the Prix Caprilli class again, our third win! This time there were five riders and we scored a 66.600%. Lots of 7s and 6s with two 8s (one on our entry centerline and the other on the, you guessed it, free walk!) Our comment was "well ridden". :-D Prix Caprilli is seriously the BEST dressage test ever!!
First 1 was an OK test. I remember being very hot and Dreamy was sluggish. It was almost all 6s, with one 7 and one 5, and we scored a 60%! LOL! We placed third out of 11 riders. The judge remarked "capable pair that needs to develop steadier more elastic connection for improved balance throughout".
And First 2 was tough. We were both pretty tired from the heat and I think I did a less-than-10-minute warmup! Dreamy decided see knew the test better than I did, so when we were transitioning down to the trot from the canter to do a stretchy trot circle, she decided to randomly canter again! :-P Foolish mare! We got a four on that transition. HA HA HA. She leaned on me in the canter and therefore had a much harder time coming up and through, so our canter work was mostly 5s and a 6. We got decent scores on our half circles and leg yields though, which was good (6s and 7s). The judge was encouraging with a "Rider working well to help horse in canter. Keep working at suppling him and good luck!" We scored a 57.900% and a sixth out of 7 riders. I was happy with the test, knowing that the heat was not helping and we had ridden the best test for that moment.
Just yesterday (over a month later), I received a champion neck sash in the mail for this show! Yay! Because it was hosted by the Standardbred Pleasure Horse Organization of Maine (SPHO-ME), they awarded the highest scoring Standardbred. There were two Standardbreds there and Dreamy was champion! Good mare!! :-)
I decided to ramp it up a little by entering Prix Caprilli, First 1, and First 2, as we had done back at the second SMDA show in June. Instead of raining, it was sweltering HOT. It was super hot, up into the 90s and they actually waived jackets. Phew!
We rocked the Prix Caprilli class again, our third win! This time there were five riders and we scored a 66.600%. Lots of 7s and 6s with two 8s (one on our entry centerline and the other on the, you guessed it, free walk!) Our comment was "well ridden". :-D Prix Caprilli is seriously the BEST dressage test ever!!
First 1 was an OK test. I remember being very hot and Dreamy was sluggish. It was almost all 6s, with one 7 and one 5, and we scored a 60%! LOL! We placed third out of 11 riders. The judge remarked "capable pair that needs to develop steadier more elastic connection for improved balance throughout".
And First 2 was tough. We were both pretty tired from the heat and I think I did a less-than-10-minute warmup! Dreamy decided see knew the test better than I did, so when we were transitioning down to the trot from the canter to do a stretchy trot circle, she decided to randomly canter again! :-P Foolish mare! We got a four on that transition. HA HA HA. She leaned on me in the canter and therefore had a much harder time coming up and through, so our canter work was mostly 5s and a 6. We got decent scores on our half circles and leg yields though, which was good (6s and 7s). The judge was encouraging with a "Rider working well to help horse in canter. Keep working at suppling him and good luck!" We scored a 57.900% and a sixth out of 7 riders. I was happy with the test, knowing that the heat was not helping and we had ridden the best test for that moment.
Just yesterday (over a month later), I received a champion neck sash in the mail for this show! Yay! Because it was hosted by the Standardbred Pleasure Horse Organization of Maine (SPHO-ME), they awarded the highest scoring Standardbred. There were two Standardbreds there and Dreamy was champion! Good mare!! :-)
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