Stills from the Horseshow

There were five horses and riders from the stable where Big Sister rides at this show. The pleasure(where the horse is judged) and equitation(where the rider is judged) classes were in the morning, the gaming classes were in the afternoon. All the riders from her stable were riding in the gaming classes. One horse competes at a time against a timer. The classes are divided by age of the rider and size of the horse. Most of the gaming horses' manes are braided, but not to make them pretty, it is practical. When one is turning the barrels or poles and reaching for the reins you don't want to get tangled up in horsehair. Big Sister and Sadie won the fifth place ribbon in barrels, horses under 54 inches, riders under age 13. I was very careful to prepare Big Sister that she would not win any ribbons. When she was much younger she participated in a horseshow. The classes she entered were leadline(where someone walks the horse on a leadline while the child rides) and costume. She won a ribbon in both classes, all the participants did. Today's show was going to be very different. It was her first show, perhaps Sadies' hundredth. The other participants have been showing awhile and would be going much faster, and they were big classes. Our (her riding instructor and me) goals for Big Sister in this show were that she have fun, be safe, complete the patterns and try for clean runs(no poles or barrels knocked over). We encouraged her to trot and if all was going well to let Sadie lope. Sadie knew where she was when we arrived and was ready to run. It was a big job for Big Sister to keep her slow. Even though Big Sister knocked over a pole we were very pleased with her classes. And she had FUN! And yes, there were more than six horses in the class where she received a ribbon. Most of the other participants were faster, but with speed comes knocked over barrels.