We woke up bright and early that morning to prepare our selves for our show. Sharne boxed Persian to the show at 8am as her class started at 9am. Persian and Sharne had a knock in their 1st class 60cm jump for joy but the day improved when they came 4th in the 70cm class.
Melcolm and I boxed Sol & Mill to the show at 10am. (1st time pulling my horses in a box) it was very exciting. They gave us very little hassle and unloaded with out a problem) the "boys"where calm and collected in their portable paddock which Wayne had assembled for them.
After tacking up I lead Sol out the paddock and tried to mount from an overturned water bucket, at this point Sol decided this was all way to exciting to stand still, I continued to mount him and as I was half way over he decided to give a little buck of joy needless to say I jumped off and tried again. lol
In the warm up, Mill was giving Sharne a hard time, having a very excited 17h Tb under you can be quite overwhelming lol. Sharne managed to work him through his excitement without flattening any passing by ponies. Sol was very relaxed and they both did the warm up jumps with ease.
Sharne and Mill went around their first class 40cm course beautifully until Mill got a little to excited before jump number 10 and fly leaped straight past it and over number 5 instead. Sharne was disappointed and they where disqualified but for Mill's 1st course at a show in 4 years, I can understand his over excitement and I was proud of them both.
Sol and I went into our 1st class 40cm course confident and calm. We had a well ridden clear round and in our Jump off we wanted to pick up the speed, the arena was a tight squeeze for a big boy like Sol but we managed to get around the course with an excellent time. Unfortunately we knocked a pole so with the penalties we came 3rd place and walked away with a nice prize and a feeling of accomplishment.
Sharne rode a fantastic round in her 2nd class 50cm on Mill and made it into the Jump off. They knocked a pole in the jump off but due to their extremely fast time still managed to come 3rd and ended the day with a smile.
My last class 50cm on Sol didnt go as well as I had hoped, We knocked 2 poles in our 1st round and didnt make it to the jump off. I was proud of him nevertheless as it was his 1st Show and he handled his nerves very well.
Thanks you to our helpers, boyfriends, students and to mine and Sharne's mom for being at the show.
From the IEA Team thanks to all our supporters.
TaneilArkner
