How to Excel At Being Average

Putting your mind to it In the pipeline is a blog about all of the amazing things we got up to in September, including BRC Quadrille, Blenheim Horse Trials demos and Beau, Sardra and Seamus being formally thanked for their participation in the Northampton town carnival parade.  Whilst i work on that though, I really felt I had to share my thoughts about how attitude and mindset really is everything in riding - and in general life Where should we focus? It's a dog eat dog world out there, and in between holding down careers, caring for families, trying to maintain a social life, shopping, cleaning and just looking after our horses, we sometimes lose sight of why we have horses - and that is to have fun! We all start our lifelong passion with horses in different ways.  I was born with it even though my family was not horsey.  Some people take up riding later in life.  For some their dream is to have a pony and as soon as they have their own job they make it come true.  As well,

Not just for men..... My partner is not flamboyant.  He does not like to dress up and owns just 2 suits for black tie do's and weddings.  But he has always been disappointed during trips to the tack shop.  If I wanted to I could come out with a pair of pink tartan breeches and a glittery gilet, but he could only ever come out with beige or black, or a muted grubby olive if very lucky He decided to do something about this, to bring a little colour into his and Parker's life - so he founded Equestriman! I am so very proud of him.  We started with a trip to BETA this January with a launch date of 1st September.  We were told by everybody that a new range of breeches in a new previously un-sourced fabric (yes never before used for breeches - even ladies) would be impossible in the timescale he set himself.  And yet here we are in September with a fully stocked webshop which did indeed launch on 1st September Not only is that an incredible achievement, but the breeches are l

I don’t know about you but I always seem to be skint.  If I ever have any spare cash I spend it immediately on a lesson or a competition, or if I am feeling very flush (or have a desperate need), new tack for my beloved horse.  Tack is a tool, a fashion statement, a way to show off your horse’s best features, to show you understand the new field of equestrian science or simply to display your own good taste in saddles.  It can help or hinder your horse as much as bad riding, and if chosen well it can improve your riding too.  Always use a qualified saddle fitter to help you – they have been thoroughly trained by the Society for Master Saddlers – a list is available on their website here:  https://www.mastersaddlers.co.uk/ £ There’s no getting away from it though – it’s an investment.   Decent tack from nosebands to discipline specific saddles is expensive.   Even if you trawl eBay and pick up good quality second-hand tack it’s still not cheap to buy, or to have to replace – so

We all have off days, horses and humans.  The important thing is not to be disheartened, but to learn from it and move on A couple of weeks ago Beau and I performed a dressage to music test at prelim level.  In theory this should have been easy, because we have all the elementary moves at home.  However that particular day Beau was having none of it We are all taught from our first time in the saddle that if something goes wrong it's our fault and not the horse's.  This was true that day as much as any other, there would have been lots of tools in a better rider's kit to overcome his behaviour.  But... never forget you are riding a living, breathing, thinking, sentient being; in Beau's case a being with plenty of his own opinions.  On a good day he is like riding a machine - very sensitive and very easy.  On a bad day he reminds me that at 21 he hasn't just read the book on evasions - he wrote it! We started well in the warm up - it was very very hot so

The day started with a cracking work out, must make horse clean, must make horse clean.  So she had a good brush for 45 minutes resulting in me looking like I’d been dragged through a white hair hedge backwards and slapped in the face a few times. Sardra looked fab and was very happy for the love and attention. Little did she know that we were off to day camp to improve our mindset, and see if we could better our dressage scores. Hard work was coming! On arrival at Moulton College, Alison was there to great us with a goody bag full of items from Equissimo, Equilibrium, Laura Mary Art, Dressage Perspectives and Alison herself.  A really nice touch that put a smile on my face before we even started. Thank you all!  Needless to say I was first on, so while my camp buddies Karen and Kaz put their horses in their stables (thank you both for getting Sardra’s water ready) I tacked up and hopped on. Now the real work started.  Sardra hadn’t been in full work for a couple of weeks, just lig

Cherwell Valley Riding Club has this year, in addition to hosting 3-day stay-over camps at Bury Farm EC, decided to hold day camps on specific disciplines.  Genius! At the beginning of May a dressage day camp was arranged, with 3 instructors offering very different skill sets and viewpoints, across 5 sessions - 2 on foot and 3 ridden Tory and I arrived with Beau and Sardra, settled them into their stables, and went off in search of a brew.  In typical CVRC fashion there were lots of people there on their own so we all helped each other settle in, then sat and got to know each other whilst coffees were poured We were divided into 5 groups of 2, and given time slots for our activities.  Tory and i were together so followed the same sessions throughout the day.  There were rest gaps too so we could watch everybody else learning.  I don't know about you but I think that can be at least as valuable as being taught directly Jules La Garde Biomechanics -  Bouncy Ball and Consisten

I grew up in Cheshire, and when i was very little i remember a village fete with knights and jousting horses.  I can't be sure but i think that is how horses got into my blood.  I can remember being completely awestruck (and possibly even speechless) at the sight of the brave knights and beautiful horses.  That day has stayed with me all these years, and never since that day have i seen horses at a carnival - until last week!  We had the honour of being invited by the Mayor and Mayoress of Northampton to lead the carnival procession through the town on Saturday June 9th 2018.  Of course without even thinking about it I said yes, and didn't find it particularly difficult to persuade the rest of the quadrille team to join me So it was agreed that we would go in our Ride of the Valkyries costumes, followed by Maloney pulling his decorated wagonette containing the Mayor and Mayoress As we got closer to the day we all started to wonder whether this had been a sensible choic

Challenges It's important to know which challenges to tackle, and then to tackle them.  There's an old prayer which I am sure you've heard of: God grant me the serenity to accept the things I cannot change, the courage to change the things I can, and the wisdom to know the difference Warm up I am learning (very slowly) that the warm up is key to everything.  Having said that we can produce some marvellous work in the warm up and then go into the arena and it all falls apart. It's almost as if when we stop and walk to the arena Beau thinks it's all over, and being so opinionated spends the next 5 minutes trying to persuade me of this! We've had some marvellous work using lateral moves in the warm up - small circles in walk leg yielding in and out gets him to accept the contact and work up into it.  I have to avoid the perfect accelerator check which is a walk to canter transition, because he offers them in the test if I do, and we are mainly at prel

Not much has happened lately.  With numerous BeastfromtheEast weather fronts, and snow and ice every weekend, it's been safer to stay home!  What has happened though, we have learned from Dressage - how to warm up We almost got 70% this month!  So close with 69.81%... In the warm up other riders were having issues with overly bouncy horses, and some riders were so focused there were actually a few crashes.  Beau is pretty wise though, and when two horses crashed right in front of us he simply stopped, waited and trotted right on as if nothing had happened!  The result of this chaos was a particularly useless warm up from me because i was just trying to steer round everyone else CVRC chairman Amanda was on hand, and seeing that we were just aimlessly bimbling about waiting to be called, she got me working on lateral work and transitions to get him listening - this was a complete revelation!  He was so attentive, soft and rideable in the test I truly believed we might get a 70