Waterloo Takeaways

While I wasn't fussed about the low scores at Waterloo, it did leave me with a couple of nagging feelings I wanted to sort out.

The first was that I wanted some validation from my trainer that I should really be showing Second. Her students normally get higher scores than my low-to-mid-60s, and I found myself dreaming of the 70s we are no doubt capable of if I'd just drop back down to First. And I know she would not BS me about this.

Unrelated: I want to take a moment to appreciate how freaking well the Fairfax (F/S) browband fits around his head.

"Absolutely, Second is where you should be," she said when I asked in my lesson last week. "Don't let last weekend get you down. It was incredibly tough going on Saturday with all the standing water, and then on Sunday the horses were all tired, probably from slogging through the mud on Saturday. And the judges didn't go easy on people."

Uh, yeah, he was tired on Sunday

While that does make me feel better, it also makes me feel like Second is just not going to be Connor's jam, which I've heard people say is true for some horses. The good news is we've achieved just about all that I want at Second, so at some point she'll say "Hey, it's time to look at Third." We know the flying changes came more easily to him than simple changes, even with CGP in the irons, so here's hoping we can put Second behind us for good soon.

Misty horse show mornings in Michigan

Second, I know I need to start focusing on Connor's fitness. We can't make Dressage any easier for him than one test per day, and in order to score well he can't be behind my leg. Riding in a lake is out of my control, but increasing his work capacity is something I can do.

The body is strong, the work capacity is weak

I had already planned on adding in 20-30 minutes of walking a few times a week when I saw Lauren Sprieser's blog published last week about talking to Jimmy Wofford about how to condition Dressage horses safely. Her plan included 20-30 minutes of walking 3x a week on hills using Equibands. 

"Oh my god are you kidding me?" - Connor probably

So that's what we're doing. One loop of our (rather hilly, for our area) property takes Connor 15 minutes, 20 if I add in the front pasture, and I put his Scoot Boots on so we could leverage the gravel driveways as well. (He's very sound on gravel, but I want to avoid finding "a rock with his name on it" in the middle of show season, as Dr. Marks would say) 

Ideally I'd like to find a way to do 20 minutes of this in the morning and then a schooling ride in the evening, at least through the summer, but we'll see if I can swing that with my schedule.

Finally, after Waterloo I emailed the NDPC show secretary and asked to add a tack stall to my entry for the first time in my life. They've always felt like such an unnecessary and expensive luxury to me, mainly showing at the HHP where my trailer is never more than 50ft from my stall and where I can wait out rain delays from the comfort of my own home if I feel like it. 

But after Waterloo, I had to admit that my teammates had the right idea with their tack stalls. They had a comfy place to hang out, a place to change clothes that wasn't a porta-potty and their show setups were very organized with lots of space to spread things out. Plus, I'm going to have an entire entourage of friends with me at Pony Cup and I don't think we'll be able to fit all those chairs in front of the stall front alone, lol. It's a GREAT problem to have!

Going forward, at least the first time I show in a new and unfamiliar place, I'll be getting a tack stall, but I still can't imagine wasting that money while showing "at home"!