Post-show wrap-up

The show this weekend was hella fun. Doc and I were in six events, which sounds like a lot, but only two (Western horsemanship and trail) were competitions; the other four were demonstrations. Not-so-secretly, they were also recruiting tools for the Western program, as we figured that if we got the crowd all psyched up, some of them might register for spots in the classes.

The first event was Western horsemanship, which is designed to rate both rider and performance. Doc always runs hot at first, and since he hadn't been ridden at more than a walk all morning, the lope shared certain qualities with the cavalry charge. We placed third, which was fine, and the judge gave me clear comments on why we had gotten that spot, so I was relatively satisfied with it. Doc did his best; I did mine; fiat.

The Powers That Be decided not to risk losing the crowd by running back to another ring for the trail competition, so we stayed in the big ring and did all the demo events first. Teacherwoman explained each event, but more to the point, she was firm with the crowd about the inadvisability of golf-clapping at Western events, and encouraged the crowd to do a lot of hooting and shrieking. (A small boy came up to Doc as we were waiting between events and said, "Do you know what I was yelling when he was going? 'What's up DOC!' Because like Bugs Bunny!" He was puzzled, though, when I hollered for Sterling, and asked his teacher, in a tone of some distress, "Why did that lady just say OW?") Doc and I basically blew it on the reining; he was so keyed up by the whooping and hollering and speed that all the bits that involved stopping ended up being washes. He did beautifully on the spins, though, and the crowd was enthusiastic. Part of the appeal was probably the novelty; Doc so rarely gets to show off his speed and power, and he's got a rep as a sweetheart, so seeing him all flashy and fast and obviously wired up tickled the regulars and the fan club.

Following the speedy deployment of the ring crew, it was time for pole-bending, an event in which the competitors run up a line of slalom poles, run back by weaving through the poles, spin, weave back up the line, and then bolt down the opposite side. It's a timed event, with penalties for missing or knocking over poles, and it favors small flexible horses. Doc...is not small or flexible. But we missed only one pole and managed not to slam me into any of them (I have a smokin' bruise on one arm from doing that in class), so again, I was happy enough. Teacherwoman took one of the barn's spookiest QH's through the course perfectly, to general delight: Okie looked shell-shocked, but by God he got his ass through the poles and back as though he had been doing it for years. Teacherwoman can ride.

The third event, cloverleaf barrels, is another one that favors the wee and bendy, but if I had done a better job setting up for the first barrel, we would've done perfectly. As it was, we nailed it for the second and third barrels, at least in the sense of getting around cleanly and fairly fast, and Doc flattened himself out for a flat bolt to the exit, as is the approved rodeo style. Our time was more than double the standard for professional competition. Yow.

The final demo event was versatility, a timed combination of pretty much everything that had gone before: a line of poles to slalom, two barrels for a figure-8, and a low jump. By that point Doc was so damn hot that it was a struggle to keep him on course, but we managed it fine and he did a perfect jump over the crossbars. I was impressed by the teenager who rode Okie through the course; he thought hard about shying from the jump, but she easily pressed him into it. Lots of hollering for that.

After all that excitement, the trail course was a bit of a comedown. Trail courses are combinations of obstacles designed to test how a horse will handle things you might encounter on the trail: flapping jackets, things to step over or through or around, stuff to pick up and carry. This one involved dismounting to pick up a purse, remounting with it in hand (at this point, the course discriminates against people with tall horses, oh me achin' hip), and riding over to put the purse down on the rail; crossing a curving array of poles decorated with fake greenery; grabbing a rain jacket off a pole and rubbing it over the horse before hanging it back up; riding through an L-shaped chute and then backing through it; and finally riding over a tarp. Doc didn't back too well (or I didn't cue him correctly), but he just sniffed at the tarp and sighed with boredom at the coat, so we got third.

Last year I went home with a first and a fourth, but I honestly feel happier with the results this year. The riders who beat us did a better job, but both Doc and I tried to do our best, and we enjoyed it; last year, Outlaw pretty nearly threw me on the trail course when he spooked at the tarp and the jacket, and he did switch into a flat gallop during the horsemanship event, eventually trying to fling himself at jumps that were still set up in the ring. Exciting? Yes. Fun? Less so.

This year, terrifying experiences in Argentina and lots of practice with El Doctor have made me a more confident rider, and part of the confidence is knowing that you can screw up and still come out happy. Nobody bleeding? Call it a win. Call it a blue ribbon. Call it a real good day.