Cowgirl Chronicles

As I sat at the horse show waiting my turn to do the Ranch Riding pattern it occurred to me that it had been 20 years since I’d shown one of my horses. Through the years I’ve been trail riding, and have attended a couple trail trials, but I have not cleaned my tack, shined my boots, practiced a pattern nor bathed my horse for the occasion. Plus, in the past two years I’ve had limited riding due to health issues. First a broken humerus and now coming to the end of 6 months of chemotherapy. Regardless, I decided I was going to put forth the effort to attend this local horse show. http://www.floresranchridingclub.com

When I arrived at the show and unloaded my 12-year-old AQHA gelding, I was surprised at how animated he became. Seems he was excited to be there too. I always follow the tenet that at every new location, you have a different horse and I exercise my horse accordingly before getting on. I hadn’t brought a lunge line as this horse is a lazy one, so I hand walked him around the grounds to get him accommodated to the commotion – vendors, food trucks, lots of horses and the obstacles.

To illustrate how excited he was, two people stopped me to ask if he was an Arabian as he pranced, snorted and threw his tail over his back! At one point I wasn’t sure he would calm down enough for me to safely ride him. (Keep in mind I’m bending doctor’s orders not to ride until I’m finished with Chemo.) After a few minutes Derby decided that this place was not so bad and he calmed down.

Back at the trailer I proceeded to saddle and get ready for my first class. I met the woman parked next to me, a seasoned Ranch Riding rider, who by the end of the day had won just about everything in her division. She was kind and helpful in answering all my questions about how the day would go. In my previous showing days, I had ridden western pleasure, horsemanship and hunt seat so this was a completely new endeavor.

When it was time for my go in the first class I was calm and confident that my horse would perform the obstacles without an issue. He did everything I asked, and I was proud of him. I left the class with a happy heart and it wasn’t until I stopped and watched the competitor that followed me that I realized I had botched the pattern. Somehow, I had shifted my horse too far right after a serpentine around hay bales and crossed a log from the wrong side. I received an OP – off pattern for this mistake and was not judged on my following obstacles, which I thought were pretty good. Human error, bummer.

My second class was Ranch Trail and given that I have been riding trail all these years, I was feeling good about this class. The only stumbling block was going to be the gate. I had practiced a left-hand gate opening all week and the gate ended up being a right-hand gate. Your horse should be able to open the gate both ways, but in deciding to practice only one way leading up to the show, my horse was confused, stepped too far from the gate and I had to let go. I later learned this error was a 5.5 point penalty. Yikes.

At the lunch break I fortuitously ended up seated next to one of the judges. I had a really great conversation with him and then with his wife, the second judge. Both were very helpful in explaining how they judge, and what they look for in a Ranch Riding horse. After lunch the score sheets were posted, and I was able to see how I ranked in comparison to the other competitors. If it weren’t for my mistakes, I would have done pretty well for my first Ranch Riding horse show. Interestingly, the male judge continued to score the horse rider team even after an OP. This is great information, especially for those new to the sport, to see where we would have placed if not for the off-pattern mistake.

Back at the trailers my neighbor’s trainer stopped by to see how her day was going. As it turns out her trainer is the trainer who started my gelding 10 years ago. No where to go but up!