We went to our second show of the year Saturday and despite going to a very spoooky facility, had much better relaxation and ride-ability. Jet was great getting off the trailer but when we got to the indoor he was LIT. My husband commented, "THIS is going to be a fun show" and I had my doubts as well, but I stuck with my plan and it all went really well. I started with TRT in hand work in a non-spooky part of the indoor until he settled, which happened quickly. Then we did in hand work in the spooky places until he settled, again pretty quickly. After that I hopped on and did my normal warm up on a 20m circle and then went everywhere. He was SUPER to warm up, relaxed, attentive, and really with me. Then it was lunch break time and we went outside to the perimeter of the dressage ring and started the whole process again. He got LIT again but settled down in hand and under saddle fairly quickly, and we spent a lot of time cruising the judge's stand and just walking with some lateral work thrown in. We also schooled the walkway from the indoor to the outdoor repeatedly because it is super spooky because horses. And then it was time for Training 1 and we were third to go.
He was much more attentive and relaxed in the test 1 compared to the show a few weeks ago. We had a few 8's, some really nice comments, and had a 72% for 3rd. Test 2 also went well, he was a little strong but still listening but had a little spook and bobble on the first canter transition. We still scored a 70% for 4th though, so no complaints. The judge was very complimentary about us as a team and really only wanted a bit more swing and a bit longer step sometimes, which I totally agree with. Even though Jet was more relaxed than last show he was at about 80% of thoroughness compared to at home tests, so I thought her judging was totally on the money. Some of the horses we were competing against were very fancy and in order for my inexpensive non-big moving pony to win in that kind of company he really has to be close to 100% correct.
I'm really pleased with how I prepped at home for this show by doing a ton more TRT in hand work, riding test movements in all the spooky places on my farm, and setting up judge's stands that were pretty scary. I also visualized myself deep breathing through everything including the tests, used my mantra of poll high, aligned, and in self carriage, and did a few steps of lateral(shoulder-in) here and there during the tests to help get Jet loosened up a bit more in his back. I also changed my overall goal to having as close to the level of relaxation and swing at the show as we do at home and we got quite a bit better on that. An improved outing and hopefully, we can do the same and get even more relaxation and thoroughness in August. FYI Jet is cool with horseshows as long as he gets paid in potato chips!
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