Monday, May 9, 2016

Fair Hill, technically speaking

Technically. Haha. Hahaha. I'm full of jokes. You see, that's a play on words. Well. Specifically the word "technical." And especially as it relates to that whole "finish with a number and not a letter" thing. I did even better and got two letters this time: TE. Technical Elimination.

Booooooo.

Getting eliminated for biffing the rules blows. But I won't say it's inexcusable tho, as I've already forgiven myself. Frankly I forgave myself even before riding over to tell coach Dan what was up (as apparently it's a subtle enough rule that it was easily missed - hence why they pay the judges I suppose).

Megan from Let's Get Ready to Runkle was at Fair Hill and we got to meet!! she's just as wonderful as you might imagine from reading her blog. and what's more - she took a whole bunch of gorgeous photos, including this stunning airborne shot of Ms Isabel doin' her thang out in the dressage court. 
And anyway, even tho our dressage was quite nice (details and media from Megan (THANK YOU) to follow!), stadium was shit-showy enough that the difference between finishing with a last place number and finishing with letters isn't particularly meaningful to me.

Le sigh.

It's a shame. Walking that stadium course, it was stupidly apparent that we should be doing novice right now. The jumps are small. They don't actually scare me (hallelujah!). We school way higher on the regular. And yet, I can still handily fuck small jumps up right and good.

The SJ course was an ideal litmus test too. As I texted Austen and Alli after walking it: it was easy and small, all bending lines with no real related distances. Essentially the perfect course for calling me out on my flaws as a rider. If I could get the appropriate canter, it would all flow perfectly.

So are you dying of curiosity yet about how this all amounted to an elimination?!? No? Oh well, I'm gonna tell you anyway haha. My blog, my rules!

isabel doesn't want to be seen in these conditions haha
Well. We had a refusal midway through course. And, as is our wont lately, we smashed right through the whole thing - necessitating a total rebuild. Judge blew the whistle (pay attention bc that's an important detail), jump crew trotted out to put the thing back together again, and I proceeded to finish my course (with one other rail - for 8 penalties) upon the jump being rebuilt.

Did.... did you notice what was missing? Bc I sure didn't until the judge waved me over. She never blew the whistle to ring me back on course. It's a safety rule - make sure jump crew is fully out of harm's way before sending the horse back on course. (Well, and also obvi a rule for the clocks too even tho this wasn't a timed course).

Womp womp woooommmppp.

at least we got good parking - this rock pile neatly prevented anybody from wanting to pull in next to us!
Oh well tho. Experience is that thing you get right after you needed it, right? (Tho some might tactfully argue that this particular experience could have been avoided by reading the rule book haha).

We jumped cross country anyway tho bc starter trials are cool like that and schooling is schooling is schooling. And it was actually pretty freaking awesome. As was dressage. Two of three ain't bad, right?

So stay tuned for more later - and especially given Megan's awesomeness in all things photography!!!!

55 comments:

  1. Oh no :( I never would have thought to wait for the whistle if it wasn't timed, either. At least you still got to go cross-country. Hurray for schooling shows :)

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    1. It honestly had never occurred to me to wait for a whistle lol. I was sitting there thinking "huh I actually don't know the rules here. Guess I'll get on with the course!" But yea xc was great and there is tons of media per usual lol

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  2. Boo! I guess I need to read the rules too... I'm glad XC was good :)

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    1. Ha apparently rules *weren't* made to be broken! At least the judge was very nice about it

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  3. Oh snap, damn whistle. Glad the show was good despite that snafu!

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    1. Lol right? Judge said she had seen riders practically jump over her fence builders before tho so I guess it makes sense...

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  4. Good on you for even finishing the course. The one and only time I crashed into a fence and necessitated a rebuild (I know, can you believe it was only once?!), I just retired from stadium and went on and did the xc (clear, I feel I should add :P). And that's why schooling trials are a thousand times better than recognized shows!

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    1. Schooling trials are best trials :) but honestly call me a glutton for pubishment or call me too nonchalant about it - but we crash through jumps so often I was really just thinking "hey it's only 4pts..." Plus it was good for my trainer to actually see me do SJ in person. I cal tell him what a hot mess we are all day long, but I think he finally believes me now lol

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  5. Technically... heh. good one. Glad you have forgiven yourself and had great experiences in dressage and XC! Can't wait for the full recap!

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    1. Thanks! Full recap is coming soon enough!! Tho I think after this post we are going to let the memories of SJ die in a fire. Ugh. But yes - forgiving ones self for stupid and avoidable errors is key to happiness with horses IMO lol

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  6. I saw someone do this exact same thing a couple months ago! It's easy to get caught up in the moment and forget a rule like that. Bummer that it happened, but now you'll never forget again. ;) Also, I had a dream just last night that I skipped an XC fence and got a TE. I always have a momentary panic after I finish a course, going over it in my head to make sure I didn't miss any. An irrational fear of a TE is solidly rooted in me, and this isn't helping!!! ;)

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    1. Omg Brita and I are always talking about how we always afraid we missed a fence on xc when we finish. I think that's a pretty common feeling. Although in this particular instance I was freed from that worry bc hey, I was already eliminated anyway lol

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  7. Well your dressage photo is beautiful! Sometimes the best way to learn is to screw up - I bet you never forget that rule again! I'm glad you got to go XC though. Yay for schooling trials!

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    1. Thanks - I'm pretty much in love with that photo too and can't wait to see the rest! And you're absolutely right, I'm not likely to forget that rule again any time soon! Lol

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  8. Oh no, lesson learned for sure! Sounds like you had a good day asides from that though and that dressage air time is picture perfect drool worthy <3

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    1. Thanks! It really was a great day! My goals for the outing were more about how the pieces fit together than about being competitive (tho nobody ever argues with a pretty ribbon!) and while I still have serious work to do in stadium everything else couldn't have been better!

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  9. Oh crap, that's too bad! So glad you were still able to go school cross country anyways!

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    1. yea, definitely a shame but not the absolute worst. i mean, at least isabel didn't know she was eliminated, right?

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  10. I had two refusals this weekend (at two different fences) and continued on, not realizing I was disqualified because h/j rules are different than xc :) I wouldn't have known to wait for a whistle either!

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    1. ugh bummer! tho fwiw i will always carry on stubbornly until someone explicitly pulls me off course - just bc nobody wants to be the one who stopped unnecessarily! esp in eventing when you get disqualified if you talk to someone (like asking, am i DQ'd?).

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  11. Womp womp. That's such a bummer! Glad the rest went well and you got a GREAT dressage photo out of it, at least :0)

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    1. thanks - that might be my favorite new dressage photo EVER haha. definitely still a bummer tho, but oh well. onwards, right?

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  12. That's a bummer. Now you know, I guess.

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  13. Ugh that totally sucks and I am sorry, though it is super cool they let you school xc anyways!

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    1. definitely cool to still go xc, since that helped reassure me that we at least can jump solid things!

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  14. I love that air photo. I'm glad they let you finish- I know some judges can be sticklers and not allow it. Just brush it off and move on to Novice! :-)

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    1. ha i have my eye on novice for sure. seriously. it's a bit ridiculous that i can't get around a course of stadium jumps at any height right now. i actually almost put in my entry for the next event at N anyway bc hey, if we're gonna get eliminated in stadium we might as well do it at N, right? but.... that's not the most rational choice ever so we will stick with BN until i can do SJ some justice. blargh. lol

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  15. Sorry about the elimination. At least you still got to do xc though; that's the fun part.

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    1. ha if it were just xc and dressage we'd be in much better shape ;)

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  16. Ack! I'm sorry to hear that. But at least they let you finish the whole thing, and you were using it as a confidence builder, right? So, confidence built? Seriously kind of sux tho.

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    1. yes and no - confidence definitely built for cross country - the mare has been on fire for our two outings so far. but stadium, the area where we need the most help in feeling confident about execution? ehhhh not so much. i have a plan tho ;)

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  17. I'm kind of surprised they called you out on this at a schooling show, but at least it was a learning experience and you got to do XC anyway!

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    1. she honestly seemed to feel pretty bad about it - but her reasoning was that she has seen straight up dangerous behavior with her jump crews almost ending up road kill, so i get it...

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  18. Ah!! That sucks, I'm so sorry! But, that dressage pic looks GREAT. And I get it. Nerves can make one forget the rules or not wait for the whistle. I'm sorry about that..But I'm sure it won't ever happen again!!

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    1. yea... sadly i can't even claim that the nerves made me forget, i just plain old didn't know. oops haha

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  19. Bummer!!! At least they still let you do cross-country. There are unfortunately quite a few little rules like that in the sport that can catch you up. Happens to the best of us!

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    1. i'm so glad they still let me do xc, it was so much fun! maybe one day i'll be up to speed on all those little rules tho haha

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  20. Aw man! That was like elimination on technicality! Although maybe they were afraid of your RAW POWER in stadium. They can't handle it.

    Glad you still got to play on xc though!

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    1. ha it was exactly like elimination on technicality. oh well, maybe next time..

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  21. That sucks. But let's be honest, we've all done something small that ends in a TE. I somehow managed to not cross the finish in one of my SJ courses.

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    1. oooh yea i've definitely heard of that - and seen it almost done on xc too. tricksy course designers!

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  22. Check out the toe flick. I admit I am some kind of jelly...

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  23. Bummer! But schooling shows rock (usually) so at least it wasn't a waste. Thank you for posting this, if anyone needs me I'll be studying the rule book.

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    1. ha yea let me know if you uncover any other useful need-to-know tidbits!

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  24. Adding anther comment because I love your coat in the dressage pic and really want to know what brand it is so I can copy your style. Promise if you tell I will stay way over here on the west coast so we won't show up at the same show all twinsies ;)

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    1. oooh the coat is the horseware competition jacket and i LOVE it - very comfortable and low maintenance too

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  25. Too bad about the elimination, but at least you got to do xc. And it was finally a nice day.

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    1. it was in fact a very nice day, so for that i'm grateful. i'll just have to work out the kinks at a later date ;)

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  26. That sucks!!! That is also the kind of mistake I'd make.

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    1. yea.... those stupid little oversights will getcha every single time!!! ugh lol

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  27. Ugh, that really sucks. I once did half my test only for the judge to ring me. Apparently I heard the bell from the other ring, and she was so engrossed in writing her comments from the previous test that she didn't notice I was going! Thankfully she let me start over, but it sure did frazzle my brain.

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