Dressage to Music Champs by Kate Riley
Tue, 24 November 2009
It was the weekend that the clocks went back and I had arranged to travel to the DTM championships with a lady (Roz) from another RC (Chiltern) as the location was miles away somewhere in Sussex! In addition, we had managed to acquire a groom for the day in the form of our mutual friend the effervescent Julie Anne. We had early times and needed to leave the yard at 7.30am so I had planned to get there just after 6 to allow time for plaiting (and tack cleaning), which meant a 5am alarm call so I could shower before I left. However being a blonde of course I forgot to put the clocks back before I went to bed and so had showered and dressed before my sleepy other half asked why we were up at 4.30 in the morning! So back to bed for another hour before getting back up and setting off. Everything went to plan at the yard and I had Tom plaited and ready to go at Roz's yard at 7.15am......... however Roz hadn't arrived! Something had gone wrong with her phone alarm and she was running late (we didn't have time to spare). Julie Anne arrived and broke into Roz's stables to feed her horse and start getting things ready. Shortly after Roz arrived and after a whirlwind 10 minutes we were loaded and off, and only 10 minutes late.
We made the 10 minutes up and arrived at the venue (having only got slightly lost once) which seemed quite empty at first prompting worries we had the wrong day but it seemed people were just arriving, strutting their stuff and leaving soon after. We unloaded and got the boys ready before heading off to warm up. Warm up went well and Roz was first in to do her test which was fabulous (I think this was only her second attempt at DTM too) followed immediately by me. I entered the arena and walked Tom around the outside and past the gallery which I thought might be a bit spooky, but apparently not. Then rather embarrassingly we discovered I had given the venue a cd case with no cd in it!!! Did I mention I was blonde? Anyway everyone was very friendly and the judges opted for a coffee break whilst I found my back up cd.
So I did mention I had walked Tom around the arena who didn't spook at anything, right? Until of course I entered the test arena. Up the centre line, halt at x, salute and start test in trot up the centre line before tracking right.... except Tom decided the dressage boards were monsters in disguise and proceeded to snort at them and refuse to go within 3ft of them! I had to cut lots of the corners off and we did the majority of the test on some random inside track where the boards couldn't get him (all with a smile on my face of course). He pratted around so much I got really behind my music and had to make up a new last part to the routine which is relatively easy if you know your music because the judge doesn't know what you were supposed to do in the first place. Anyway we completed and left the arena feeling a bit deflated about travelling for 2 hours for four and a half minutes of naughtiness, but Julie Anne assured me it didn't look as bad as I thought.
We waited for our scores to go up and unbelievably when they did we were in first and second place, both with over 70% - amazing! It turns out the judges really liked my music which overcame some of the other difficulties I had during the test. I started getting quite excited and was mentally picturing where the trophy would go (because we thought the class was nearly finished) until we realised we weren't quite halfway through. Another score pushed in between us placing us first and third where we stayed for ages - until the last handful of people in the class, who were all rather good unfortunately and we got pushed down to 5th and 7th where we finished.
It was a fun day and many thanks to Julie Anne for grooming. It was good to see some of the costumes in the class after us and has definitely inspired me - it would be great to have a go at quadrille and try to qualify for Olympia - is there anybody out there who likes making costumes maybe?????