26 May 2010

horse show :)

wish this wasn't blurryyyy. 

after halter or showmanship.
Cruizer's first horse show went pretty well. Overall I was pleased with him, particularly how quiet and non-spooky he was. The only thing that upset him was being at the trailer by himself when Rolie and Hootie were showing, which was solved when I went and stood by him. He does like me sometimes. We were in the first class of the day, English Horse in Hand, and he was fourth out of like twelve-ish horses. I only went in that class so he could chill in the arena and relax, but a fourth is acceptable lol. Didn't think he would get anything due to his slightly long back and being over at the knee. However, he does have a great hip, hind leg, head & throatlatch, and neck to shoulder tie in. Our next class was the 14-18 showmanship. He wiggled in the beginning, messing up my line and making the judge wait for a second until he was set up again (Cruizerrrrrr ugh) Our pattern was good, could have been better obviously. It was trot to cone three, back to cone two, 270 pivot, walk to judge, set up, walk to line up. We've done this pattern literally eight million times. The footing was REALLY deep and hard to run in. He pivoted on the incorrect foot, possibly because of the footing and because we were in the bridle instead of halter and chain, our back was good, and his set up was decent. Setting up is the hardest thing for him. He also trotted off right away from the start which was good. We ended up fourth. I think there were about 10-15 horses in the class. I was okay with the fourth because 1. our pattern wasn't as good as I would have liked and 2. my friend Kelsey was second somehow, and she is the showmanship QUEEN. Seriously. She always wins showmanship, even at state. Oh well. I then tacked him up and lunged him for five minutes before getting on to ride in open ring. He was AWESOME in the warm up. Literally. He was right there in my hands, head down, relaxed, and couldn't have cared less about the traffic. Riding off the rail all the time at home has improved his steering drastically. Yay. From there we went into the 14-18 english pleasure where he was second out of again 10-15 horses. The only thing he did wrong was he kept pushing his nose out to try and get more rein, of course usually in front of the judge. That's okay though. First show of the year, fourth show of his life. From there we went right back into the open english pleasure. We did not place in that class. He got chargey at the canter (he was really hot, it was 90 degrees out, and he had sweat running down his face and foam all over, and I did NOT overwork him, I'm thinking the heat really aggravated him) and then at the trot I gave him more rein since he finally started relaxing, and so he popped up into a canter, a foot in front of the judge, while she was looking directly at us. That killed our class. I decided to not do eq because we were both aggravated and way too hot. Damn heat. I sponged him off after that to try and cool him off. Poor boy was SO sweaty and hot. Overall I was very happy with his behavior and performance. I cannot get over how flawless he was in the warm up.  
Cruizer doing his best giraffe impression.

Left side, Cruizer's amazing fake tail!

My friend Kelsey and I *Team Evil* ready to kick some ass. We went first and second in this class. :)

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