It was crisp and clear this morning as we all met together for another mid-winter early morning. The ponies all wondered why they were getting on the float instead of eating grass in the paddock; at least mine did! The D group were on first and had lots of fun in their first lesson up in the RDA yard, going under streamers and over tarps.
There was also some pretty interesting lunging going on in the Marshelling yard with the C, C* and B group. Gally and Tiger were very well behaved and patient with everyone though! Then this group had flatwork and everyone did pretty well with their trot-halt transitions and not so well with their leg yielding! It was getting there though, and once again the ponies were very well behaved. Especially Darcie did really well riding Gally, since she had never ridden him before and he was a bit bigger than she is used to! We learnt that some of us need to practice our flatwork at home a bit more often!
Having fun in flatwork.
There was a delicious lunch provided by our ever vigilant canteen volunteers, lead by Barb who always does a good job. It’s great to have so many mums helping out with this, doesn’t it just make everything so much easier? All those hungry children are forever indebted to you!
Lunch: time for a short nap!
After lunch there was more action in the RDA yard, this time with the D candidate group. Although not many of the riders legs were quite good enough to get their ponies over narrow fences, they did everything else very well!
What was left of the D group had a brilliant time cross country, apart from a little bit of excitement for Danielle and Renny, who decided she didn’t like being away from the other horses! They eventually had some fun though going over the tyres and the Z jump.
Some personal bests were achieved with Kate in the last showjumping lesson of the day, getting over a double in an inspiring fashion (even if she did keep going too slow). Tully was exceptionally behaved as he has proved himself to be thus far. Although Dior thought Neffi was “dead”, she seemed to be pretty normal to the rest of us and maybe just needed a bit more hard work!
All in all a great day, hope to see some Spalding members helping, watching or competing at the GCEC July showjumping on the 12th, 13th and 14th; it’s a great event with some very high jumps which is great entertainment! Failing that see everyone at the zone school at Walkaway from the 16th! For more photos of this rally see under the Gallery tab.
❤ Sarah
Spalding Horse and Pony Club 