Well, Sunday was Max's first attempt in the ETI Trail Trials and overall, it wasn't a bad first outing although it clearly demonstrated that there are areas that need some serious work.
The competition started at 9 am and several members from EIT Corral 10 participated (although I wound up starting much earlier than my compadres). The scoring system works on each contestant having 100 points to start with and points are marked off for mistakes made in negotiating the various obstacles. A perfect score is 100.
The first obstacle was easy- you were judged on having proper tack to include a hoof pick and lead rope. That one was pretty much a gimmee- any kind of saddle, bridle/bit, and reins are acceptable. Unfortunately the next obstacle was, naturally, a gate. No matter how close I tried to get Max to approach it, Max wouldn't do it so I finally had the judge open the gate and dock me a full 10 points (each station has a maximum of 10 points that can be marked off). This wasn't too much of a surprise since we haven't done much work with this and Max's side-passing isn't the best.
The next four obstacles weren't anything that Max hasn't done before and in fact, followed trails that Max normally rides all the time. Max sailed accross the river crossing with flying colors and I got marked off on the uphill climb because I forgot to check the girth strap and I trotted (you're supposed to do it at a walk).
Max backed up nicely but I forgot to look back on both sides before backing up. Max also handled a tunnel obstacle (I was a bit unsure since we havn't been that way in awhile). Unfortunately, just as I expected, as soon as the course turned in a direction roughly heading back to the stables, Max began to get excited and was expecting to be heading home ("Come on Dad, we're going home! Screw waiting around for some silly obstacles, let's run!!"). I had to keep him moving and he didn't like stopping at each station and waiting for the horses ahead of him to complete the obstable (lucky we were in the front of the pack!).
I lost points on the downhill walk because I didn't collect him enough (hell, I was keeping him from charging down the hill- screw collection at this point!). Max was complete oblivious to the one obstacle where you had to ride accross a sand crater filled with empty plastic bottles and jugs- Max kicked them out of the way and plowed through!
The next obstacle was a set of bars that the horse has to step over (they're designed to simulate horizontal bars that are often installed at trail entrances to discourage bikes and motorcycles). Max refused to walk accross and rather, took his time sniffing them and checking things out. Eventually Max stepped over them. I was marked off 5 points for this, which I really disagreed with- their criteria is that the horse should cross with no question. To me, checking out the obstacle is natural and in fact, I encourage it- you don't necessarily just want to drive a horse through a situation even when he's nervious. Let him check it out a bit first. Of course, if the horse refuses, that's another matter. Oh well, I guess it's a matter of interpretation.
The final obstacle was located in an area with heavy vegetation know as the "ponds". The obstacle itself consisted of the horse having to cross a muddy/sandy area that's under about two feet of water. Nothing major. However, by the time I got there, there was a bit of a wait and I was behind four horses. The trail itself was narrow and walled in with vegetation and there were horses to the front and rear. Basically, we were trapped with nowhere to move to. Max increasingly became agitated and while I was able to move him about a little bit, it wasn't good enough and eventually he blew up by rearing and them charging into the underbrush on the left side of the trail. I have visions of Max screaming "You horses are obviously too stupid to see that you're going to get eaten! I'll make my own trail and get out of here now! Opps...maybe not..."
Needless to say, I was a bit scared, especially since Max was pinned by all sorts of branches and the like. I was having nightmare visions of him either impaling himself or injuring an eye (or all of the above). Fortuantely, Max stopped thrashing when he got pinned and I quickly thought up a plan. I gently backed him up and got him back on the trail. I then dismounted and checked him out- there were a few cuts and scratches but nothing major (I also found out later that he'd loosened up a shoe). I got back on Max and we were immediately able to negotiate the obstacle (I basically told the grader that either we take the obstacle or I go around- no more waiting). We then quickly got ourselves on the trail heading back to the start point and at the same time exited the woods.
I was a bit bummed out over this incident but I can't blame Max and it's clear that he probably felt threatened- probably because of the confinement of the trail and the fact that other horses were moving off and he couldn't joining them. Who knows? I'll have to work more with him on this.
One of the disadvantages of working in a familiar area is that the horse has certain expectations of when it's time to go home, etc. and when we didn't meet them, he got anxious or just plain obnoxious. The waiting at each obstacle was the worst part- this might improve if I were to do a trail trial at a location Max is not familiar with. Worth a try.
In the end, we placed 17th out of a field of some 48 and if it wasn't for the gate, we would have come hom with a ribbon of some sort. Oh well, time to start training more...
The competition started at 9 am and several members from EIT Corral 10 participated (although I wound up starting much earlier than my compadres). The scoring system works on each contestant having 100 points to start with and points are marked off for mistakes made in negotiating the various obstacles. A perfect score is 100.
The first obstacle was easy- you were judged on having proper tack to include a hoof pick and lead rope. That one was pretty much a gimmee- any kind of saddle, bridle/bit, and reins are acceptable. Unfortunately the next obstacle was, naturally, a gate. No matter how close I tried to get Max to approach it, Max wouldn't do it so I finally had the judge open the gate and dock me a full 10 points (each station has a maximum of 10 points that can be marked off). This wasn't too much of a surprise since we haven't done much work with this and Max's side-passing isn't the best.
The next four obstacles weren't anything that Max hasn't done before and in fact, followed trails that Max normally rides all the time. Max sailed accross the river crossing with flying colors and I got marked off on the uphill climb because I forgot to check the girth strap and I trotted (you're supposed to do it at a walk).
Max backed up nicely but I forgot to look back on both sides before backing up. Max also handled a tunnel obstacle (I was a bit unsure since we havn't been that way in awhile). Unfortunately, just as I expected, as soon as the course turned in a direction roughly heading back to the stables, Max began to get excited and was expecting to be heading home ("Come on Dad, we're going home! Screw waiting around for some silly obstacles, let's run!!"). I had to keep him moving and he didn't like stopping at each station and waiting for the horses ahead of him to complete the obstable (lucky we were in the front of the pack!).
I lost points on the downhill walk because I didn't collect him enough (hell, I was keeping him from charging down the hill- screw collection at this point!). Max was complete oblivious to the one obstacle where you had to ride accross a sand crater filled with empty plastic bottles and jugs- Max kicked them out of the way and plowed through!
The next obstacle was a set of bars that the horse has to step over (they're designed to simulate horizontal bars that are often installed at trail entrances to discourage bikes and motorcycles). Max refused to walk accross and rather, took his time sniffing them and checking things out. Eventually Max stepped over them. I was marked off 5 points for this, which I really disagreed with- their criteria is that the horse should cross with no question. To me, checking out the obstacle is natural and in fact, I encourage it- you don't necessarily just want to drive a horse through a situation even when he's nervious. Let him check it out a bit first. Of course, if the horse refuses, that's another matter. Oh well, I guess it's a matter of interpretation.
The final obstacle was located in an area with heavy vegetation know as the "ponds". The obstacle itself consisted of the horse having to cross a muddy/sandy area that's under about two feet of water. Nothing major. However, by the time I got there, there was a bit of a wait and I was behind four horses. The trail itself was narrow and walled in with vegetation and there were horses to the front and rear. Basically, we were trapped with nowhere to move to. Max increasingly became agitated and while I was able to move him about a little bit, it wasn't good enough and eventually he blew up by rearing and them charging into the underbrush on the left side of the trail. I have visions of Max screaming "You horses are obviously too stupid to see that you're going to get eaten! I'll make my own trail and get out of here now! Opps...maybe not..."
Needless to say, I was a bit scared, especially since Max was pinned by all sorts of branches and the like. I was having nightmare visions of him either impaling himself or injuring an eye (or all of the above). Fortuantely, Max stopped thrashing when he got pinned and I quickly thought up a plan. I gently backed him up and got him back on the trail. I then dismounted and checked him out- there were a few cuts and scratches but nothing major (I also found out later that he'd loosened up a shoe). I got back on Max and we were immediately able to negotiate the obstacle (I basically told the grader that either we take the obstacle or I go around- no more waiting). We then quickly got ourselves on the trail heading back to the start point and at the same time exited the woods.
I was a bit bummed out over this incident but I can't blame Max and it's clear that he probably felt threatened- probably because of the confinement of the trail and the fact that other horses were moving off and he couldn't joining them. Who knows? I'll have to work more with him on this.
One of the disadvantages of working in a familiar area is that the horse has certain expectations of when it's time to go home, etc. and when we didn't meet them, he got anxious or just plain obnoxious. The waiting at each obstacle was the worst part- this might improve if I were to do a trail trial at a location Max is not familiar with. Worth a try.
In the end, we placed 17th out of a field of some 48 and if it wasn't for the gate, we would have come hom with a ribbon of some sort. Oh well, time to start training more...
The final obstable
No comments:
Post a Comment