Monday 13th April Our First Show

Today Xaile went to his first show (and my first for well over 10 years, and by far the biggest I've ever done). We went to the Four Winds Show at Vicarage Farm. I entered the Parade Class and the Iberian Novice Rider.

Ali very kindly had agreed to come with us an look after us and keep us clean and tidy.  She started very early by plaiting Xaile absolutely beautifully.  It being a long time since I've been to a show I wasn't really as organised as I should have been ad we ended setting off 1 1/2 hours later than I'd planned!  Luckily the traffic was very much on our side and we weren't too late.  Freddie very kindly lunged him to settle him while I changed and then Ali tacked him up.  He was quite excited by the whole thing and rather bouncy so I was pleased to be able to mount abnormally easily in my long skirt.

We then had a good warm up session with Freddie, and Susan on Unico.  We managed to get him calm and concentrating.

But when we got to the ring he forgot about being calm and concentrating.  Well I probably did as well!  We jogged sideways around the ring while everyone else walked but he didn't do anything really naughty.  The judge then said that she'd start off running the class as a normal Parade Class, but that we were all to be civilised and go on the same rein.  I didn't really have a great idea of what I was meant to be doing but I did some lateral stuff and transitions within trot and canter as he's good at that.  She then asked us to change rein.  I was cantering at the time and so was pleased to be able to put in a rather tidy little flying change.  

 

After we'd paraded for a while she lined us up (random order) and asked us for individual shows.  Xaile decided that there was no way he could stand still.  There was way too much to look at.  So we went round and round in circled, sometimes backwards.  When I did manage to make him stand still he decided it was time to show off the Spanish walk he's been learning.  So I thought walks circles were probably less distracting for everyone else.  Unfortunately this meant that I wasn't able to see what everyone else had done for their show. 

In the end I did more of what I'd done in the parade- lots of transitions between a faster and a more collected canter.  I then did a few canter figure of 8s with flying changes, thanks to good advice from Freddie.  Then reinback and what I thought was rather a good transition to canter. 

Then we were all sent off to walk around while the judge made here decisions.  I was so so thrilled to be called in 4th. The judge also very kindly said that we'd have been placed higher if Xaile had been more settled.

There was time for a short lunch break and for him to cool down a bit and for me to change into my English clothes for the Novice Rider class.  In the end we'd taken a bit too long over it (despite Ali's speed tacking up! Thank you!!!) and there wasn't time to warm him up any more which was a shame as it isn't give him a chance to settle to the change of tack.  This meant that when we went into the ring he was a bit tense.  However he settled to walking a round a bit better than in the parade class.  This didn't mean that he'd stand still in the line though- not a bit of it.  More spinning and pawing the ground.  I tried to keep him occupied by walking round in circles.

For our show I did a little bit of walk (though no one else seemed to, but the judge had asked us to) then I trotted a figure of 8 and then cantered a circle on each rein.

Then back to walking around while she thought.  This time I was even happier to be called in 3rd.

So over all I couldn't really have been more pleased with my boy's first show.

Videos very kindly taken by Ali and photos by Claire!!!