Heart of the Valley - Part 2

Super long recap of Friday/Saturday here

Day 2 of the show was much sunnier and nicer than the day before. Luckily I didn't have to ride until 9:55am so I had a little bit of time to sleep in before showing up and giving Misty breakfast, cleaning her stall, etc.

She was being such a beggar!

My first ride was in the terrace arena unfortunately. I heard of a lot of people scratching their rides in that arena because of the deep footing and supposedly one horse tore its suspensory during their ride. Yikes.

Misty was pretty good though. I lunged her first this time around so she could get all her bucks out without me on her back, resulting in a much quieter warm-up. I would have rather have ridden in the sand arena which had dried out, but at least the terrace ride was the first ride of the day so she wasn't too tired. Still had a moment or two where she wanted to canter to get out of the deep footing, but better than the day before. One more bobble in the last corner before turning up the centerline where it was like a sinkhole and she tried to walk, meaning we got marked down half a point from a 7 to a 6.5. The test was all 6's and 7's except for one 5 where she jumped into the canter before I brought her back down.

All 6.5's for collective marks except for a 7 for rider and the final comments: "Maintain verticle balance in canter circles. Tension in back creates some irregular steps at times. Work to supple this and develop a consistant reach to bit. Energetic ride."

I was super happy to see we got a 65%. Of course, only person in this class = automatic first place. Oh well. I think this was our best ride (well, not just because of the score, but how it felt). I wish we had gotten a video but my camera died.

We had a little time so she got to hang out in her stall for a bit then we got back on. She warmed up really well, before we took a group picture then we headed down to the indoor. Once in the indoor warm-up arena... Misty was AMPED. I don't think she's ever had this much energy in her entire life. I thought she'd be tired but noooo, she was a little fireball. We did serpentines and long and low and transitions. Nope. Nothing calmed her down. So we zooooomed around the indoor arena in our final test. She didn't make any mistakes but she was TENSE.

And our score of course reflected that. 60% and last place. Bummer. All the comments were "tight" "tense" and "hollow". Final comments: "Attractive horse who must be more relaxed and balanced and reaching to the contact. Too tense today. Keep working!" I don't think it was just the indoor that made her so tense because she's not typically scared of new places. Honestly I think it was the hot walker that terrified her! (They have one of those awesome Eurocisers). She just couldn't tear her eyes off of it whenever it was in her view and she was so antsy after seeing it. She was convinced the horses were being tortured and needed to be rescued!

Doesn't get any better. Hanging in the sunshine watching the 3rd level classes.

Overall, a really fun weekend. It was a great learning experience for Misty. I love that every show something new finally "clicks" with her. The last show it was transitions, this show it was the free walk. By the end she was finally "getting" what she was supposed to do. Great group of people I was with and I was happy with how Misty did. I just wish I could afford to do more recognized shows now!

No pictures of us riding. I wanted to take screenshots from the video, but apparently my video-editing software doesn't actually have that capability even though I thought it did? Still waiting on proofs to be loaded from the professional photographer. I plan on buying one or two from her. I'll post the link when it's available!

Video from Saturday: