Road to the American Eventing Championship: Chronicling a Show Season
Introduction
I have been riding horses for almost years and it has become a major part of my life. It has become my
deepest passion, and every minute that I get to spend with horses, both my own and the others that I have had the opportunity to work with over the years, is a gift, no matter how frustrating it can be when there are setbacks. Therefore, I jumped at the chance to include my horse in an honors experience; it is an integral part of who I am, and I have frequently found myself planning for my future with horses in mind. This year, I am planning my show season with the end goal of being successful at the American Eventing Championship, the national championships of my sport (eventing), which I qualified for last year. This experience will encompass my training in preparation for the American Eventing Championship at the beginning of September. I will be tracking and reflecting on my training progress with my horse and the personal growth that I hope to experience while doing so.
My horse's name is Renos Nevada; we call him Reno. He is a 19-year-old Paint gelding. He is half
Thoroughbred (as in racehorse) and occasionally remembers that fact. He is super quirky, which is generally endearing and only sometimes annoying. But he's pretty sweet, and while he is tough to ride, he is a lot of fun. I am currently competing him at the Novice level of eventing, which is where he is most comfortable at his age. My trainer, who competes alongside me at the same level with her two amazing horses, Drummer Boy and Landtino, is Madeline.
Eventing is an Olympic sport that is considered the "equestrian triathlon" because it consists of three
separate sports: dressage, cross country, and show jumping. Dressage is always first, because it is where you get your base score. In it, you perform a pattern of movements at each of the horse's gaits, walk, trot, and canter. A judge scores each movement from 1 to 10 based on the horse and rider's performance and harmony. The scores are a little confusing because to get your final score, you find the percentage of points that you got compared to what you could have gotten and then subtract that from 100 (yeah, it's convoluted, I know). Scores generally range from 20 to 45 (with lower being better). Following dressage, there are two jumping phases, where points are added to your score for mistakes. Cross country is the heart of eventing, since it's the only unique phase. It involves jumping "natural" obstacles in a open field. It's timed, with an optimum time that you aim to get close to without exceeding. The other is show jumping, which is in an arena where you jump colorful obstacles with rails that can fall down, which adds points to your score. In either phase, your horse has to jump the jumps the first time; otherwise you incur penalties. The lowest score wins.
I had intended to have this experience follow an entire show season, but due to COVID travel restrictions, it’s
starting off a little later than originally planned. I’ve already been in three shows this year. The first was Spring Bay at the Kentucky Horse Park in April, which went poorly, to say the least - I had a stop at the two stride in-and-out in stadium, which I still don’t have an explanation for and at this point I’ll never know why Reno looked at that and just went “Nope. Can’t do that today.” We did make it through and jumped clean in cross country the next day, but it knocked my confidence pretty badly. Luckily, he stepped up at the next show at Miami Valley, our first time ever showing at Twin Towers Horse Park in Dayton, and my grandmother, who is a big supporter of my riding, was able to be there to watch us win! With a very respectable dressage score of 32.1 despite Reno springing a shoe in the deep mud in warmup right before we were supposed to go in the arena (basically his shoe was half on, half sticking several inches off his foot, not exactly an ideal situation) necessitating an emergency visit to the farrier and then we got to circle the arena once before going in. He followed that up with a foot-perfect cross-country round and an ugly but clear show jumping round in a totally flooded grass arena to move up from third to win. We then went to Indiana for the classic three day, a much tougher show that features trot-ups, where you get dressed up to present your horse to the ground jury, a longer dressage test in a big arena, and most importantly, endurance day, where you complete roads and tracks and steeplechase prior to cross country. Reno was great for the steeplechase, where you gallop much faster than you would at any other show, an awesome adrenaline rush, and for by far the toughest novice cross country course I’ve ever seen. He was kept out of the ribbons by an unfortunate rub at the last fence in stadium, but he was tired and displaying signs of EPM, a neurological illness that flared up at the show and we treated fully afterward. He is now back to his normal self and ready for our next show.
The American Eventing Championship is the last weekend of August at the Kentucky Horse Park in
Lexington. There are three shows before that I will also be following, Cobblestone Farm Horse Trials in Dexter, Michigan, Champagne Run Horse Trials at the Kentucky Horse Park, and Hoosier Horse Trials in Edinburgh, Indiana.
Cobblestone Farm Horse Trials
We’re starting off the experience with a bang- a win at Cobblestone Farm in Dexter, Michigan! The family
that runs the show recently purchased a golf course that they’re converting into an eventing venue. Every eventer dreams of galloping on golf courses so that was pretty cool. They weren’t quite ready to be hosting recognized events so I’m sure that it’ll be even better next year. The weekend started out with some drama because Madeline was in the same class on both of her horses and they put us both in open classes full of professionals despite our requests to be in rider classes, where people can’t have ridden more than two levels above Novice in the past 5 years. Regardless, we sucked it up and got our rides in on Friday evening- Reno was pretty quiet. We also walked our courses. Saturday rolled around and we struggled to find a place to take Landtino and Reno for our morning pre-ride. The footing in the dressage arenas and warmup was extremely deep, and it was already starting to get muddy in show jumping warmup, which meant that by the time we got to jump it would be a mess. We did a little bit in the dressage warmup before it got too crowded then moved to a grassy area closer to stabling. Karl did me a huge favor by lunging Reno right before my dressage, and when I went to warm up in that deep, sucky footing, I focused on pushing him forward and underneath himself. I felt like I was fully warmed up and ready to go, but my ring was running late, so the waiting game began. On the bright side, I got to watch Madeline’s test with her second ride of the day, Landtino, which went well. I kept walking and would occasionally trot or canter a circle or change of bend to keep Reno focused on the task at hand, until finally, finally we were sent up to circle the arena. The rider in front of me was someone we knew, a young professional on a very nice horse. The judge was talking to her after her test, which was a little odd, but I tried not to dwell on it as I began to trot around the arena. The footing around the arena (and inside, I would find out soon, though to a lesser extent), was even deeper than the warmup, and extremely uneven. I went several laps around before the judge blew the whistle- which again, was a little odd, but as long as I kept Reno’s attention and was careful not to offend him with this boring dressage thing, it would be okay.
And hey, it actually was! I rode a lovely, accurate test, and Reno was a very good boy. Reno stayed in a
consistent frame with the his hind end really stepping up underneath himself (all good things, non-horse people). My changes of bend at the trot were precise, I got a nice stretch during both the free walk and the trot stretch circle, and both canters were good, which is usually the most difficult part for Reno. He started to get a little quick in the second canter circle at the end of the test, but he relaxed enough to get a very accurate halt, which was one of three 8s on the test. One of the others was for my first change of bend at the trot, and the other was for gaits, which was a big shock considering Reno is not a purpose-bred dressage or event horse like many of the other horses that we compete against, who are much fancier movers than Reno. Looking back, I think what made the difference was that I drove him forward with my seat to really get him stepping up underneath himself in the deep sand. Other people probably rode how they normally would, which may have worked for them elsewhere, but that footing required a totally different ride. The horses needed significantly more power than they would have normally. The judge was very complimentary of Reno and of my ride, and I was absolutely thrilled with the score of 27.9. It was not my lowest dressage score with Reno - that actually came at Cobblestone's old venue last year, a 27.2 - but the judging at that show was a lot more generous, and I definitely felt like this was my best test to date. After dressage, I was in second, behind only a young professional rider on a very fancy imported mare. To say I was thrilled was an understatement.
Next up was show jumping. Cobblestone has a history of being pretty tough for show jumping at their own
venue, which definitely has at least something to do with the fact that it was always held in the grass on a slight slope, which most people aren't used to for show jumping. We didn't know if the same would hold at the new venue, but the course was set up in a relatively small grass area. We went over to watch the level above us to get a feel for how the course was riding, and it was... not exactly confidence-boosting. The first four horses in the class got eliminated, which I don't think I've ever seen happen before. One was eliminated for having too many refusals, the next could not get her mare to get anywhere near the triple combination and eventually just gave up, the next was given a compulsory retirement for having too many rails, and the next missed a fence, which is a technical elimination. We left as soon as we saw a horse jump clear to get ready and try not to think about the train wreck that we had just witnessed. I helped Madeline get her back-to-back rides done- she jumped clear on Landtino and had a surprising rail down on Drummer, but stayed in second and third, just switching which horse was in which place. The warmup was tough, way too small and already beat up by the time Novice was jumping, so I didn't do a ton of warmup jumps and mostly watched. The horse in first was right before me, so I watched her jump, and she had two rails down, which meant that if I jumped clear, I would be in the lead. I was conscious of that going into the ring. I thought I got a quality canter and a good spot to the first jump, but Reno was just a little too casual with his hind feet and rolled the front rail out of the cup. I have to say, there's very few things that are more demoralizing than having the first rail down, but we both sharpened up and the rest of the round was nice. I definitely rolled my eyes at myself coming out of the ring, frustrated in thinking that I had thrown away a chance to be winning. But the course was so tough that it turned out that even with 1 rail, I was still in first. I got the rare opportunity to spend the night worrying about cross country way more than I normally would.
Believe me, I was worried. Not that there was anything out there that I thought would bother Reno, I was just
not used to being in this position and I was super nervous about making some stupid mistake and blowing it. I walked the course once more in the evening and twice more the next day. Madeline rode before me with Drummer, which gave her the chance to report back to me. She said the time was fast, which I took to heart, because Drummer is two full hands (8 inches) taller than Reno so his stride is a lot longer, so Reno has to travel quicker to cover the same amount of ground. Warmup was all good, pretty relaxed, with a lot more room than stadium had. It felt like it took forever though. When it was finally my turn to go, I left the start box and heard my name and Reno's name being announced as leading the class, which I think set off something in me, and I put my leg on and hustled. Well, Reno responded beautifully to that - I think he learned a new gear in the steeplechase at the classic three-day in Indiana - and jumped perfectly. But I was so worried about making the time, knowing that I could not afford to be even a second over the optimum to stay in the lead, that I went way too fast. I should have slowed down or taken some wider lines at the end of the course, but I didn't realize how far up on the clock I was and ended way too close to the speed fault time (the too-fast time also gets to time penalties if you go under it). I was panicked for a while after I rode, knowing that I may have blown my win, but when the scores finally came out, I had just squeaked through, meaning that I won! I was so excited. Even though the weekend wasn't perfect, it proved to be a tough show, so winning, especially in a class with professionals, was thrilling for me. Reno was great all weekend. He earned his time off before we turn around for Champagne Run in two weeks.
Champagne Run Horse Trials
This weekend was a not-so-nice example of the ups and downs of the horse world. The weekend started off
chaotic; we brought a horse that we had sold to a friend and the whole thing was off from the start. I won’t go into the messy details of what happened with that, but it was a reminder of why I’m getting an engineering degree and not flipping horses for a living. Dealing with people trying to buy and sell horses is not something I want to do on a regular basis. The drama put a damper on the whole weekend, and it wasn’t helped much by the on-and-off rain. Dressage was relatively good, though I felt like I could have gotten a little bit more impulsion. I was really happy to get an 8 on one of my canter circles, which has never happened before. The canter is Reno’s weakest gait and has been the thing we’ve worked the most on over the past year in the dressage arena. It was nice to see that rewarded. We ended up with a fair 31.2, which put us in sixth place. Cross country was really nice, one of our best rounds this season. The optimum time was oddly tight, and the speed was at the maximum it could be for novice. Reno got into a super rhythm, and while I knew that I was up on the clock, I really didn’t want to take a pull and mess that up. I ended up circling between the last two fences to kill a little time, but I was happy with the ride. The course ended up being tough for a lot of people and less than half the class went clear, which was surprising since I didn’t think was all that difficult. It was a pretty standard mid-season novice course. The horse selling drama continued through the afternoon and the next morning, which was distracting. Madeline still managed to be second with Drummer and win with Landtino. I didn’t ride until very late in the day on Sunday, which compounded the anxiety of the situation since I had to wait around and be mixed up in the mess. I struggled to get Reno moving forward in the warmup, and once we actually got to the show jumping arena, I think I forgot how to ride. I had a bad line to the second fence and didn’t give Reno room to clear it, and I think that the memory of the stop earlier in the year at Spring Bay got the better of me, making me rush him, so I had two more fences down, another vertical like the second and the second part of the two-stride in-and-out. I came out of the ring so frazzled and frustrated, knowing I had given up a chance to place third or better since I had moved up after cross country. Reno and I were just not on the same page. Our next show at Hoosier Horse Park is only two weeks away, the last one before AEC, and we have a lot to work out before then.
Hoosier Horse Trials
Well, it was an improvement over Champagne Run, so I can’t complain too much about how this weekend at
Hoosier Horse Trials in Indiana went. I was nervous after Champagne Run, and while the last time we had been to Indiana had been fun for the three-day event, Reno had gotten EPM, which can be triggered by stress. I was concerned that something about the venue might have caused it in June so were were extra careful with the preparations and travel to make it as stress-free as possible. Champagne Run was definitely weighing heavily on my mind, and in the two weeks that we had between the two shows, I didn't feel like any we had made real breakthroughs. I wasn't sure what the disconnect was between Reno and me.
We got to the show grounds on Friday and did a pre-ride. The ground was very hard because it hadn't
rained. It was going to be something to keep in mind on cross country day on Sunday, but I had the problem phases to worry about first on Saturday, dressage and show jumping. On Saturday morning, I had dressage. I thought the test went well; it maybe could have used a little more forward, but it was accurate and consistent, so I was a bit disappointed by the score, which put me in eighth. I was kind of surprised since the judge was someone we knew and she is usually pretty fair to the non-warmblood types who weren't bred to be fancy movers like Reno, but I was happy with the performance and you can't control the judge. Besides, we weren't there for the dressage anyway. My main goal for this show was to put the show jumping troubles to bed. The warmup for show jumping was in a small, terrible arena with super uneven footing. Reno is kind of wimpy about bad footing anyway, and he wasn't confident jumping in there. He kept adding an extra stride right in front of the fence and jumping awkwardly. It really wasn't the best preparation in a confidence crisis. I'd been trying to work on riding him a little more collected and underneath himself so he was better balanced, but when they're burying themselves into the base of the fence at every warmup jump, it's a very uncomfortable feeling as a rider. I just could not get him in front of my leg. When we were two horses out, I went to gallop around a few laps in the field next to the in-gate of the show jumping arena just to get him moving a little bit more forward. I got into the arena, got a nice quality canter and a perfect spot to the first jump, and in a repeat of Cobblestone, Reno just wasn't careful with his feet and rolled the pole out of the cups. Luckily I didn't panic about it and the rest of the round went well, unlike after my early fence down at Champagne Run, but it was frustrating. Normally when I look back at my rides I'm able to identify something that I could have done better, but in this case I genuinely don't feel like I could have had a better ride to that first fence. Reno was just too casual. The course rode well for most people so we moved down a little in the order, which meant we were pretty unlikely to place. I really wanted to go clear in that round, so I was bummed out, but I was still looking forward to cross country.
Cross country was the next day. The ground was so hard that I didn't jump very many warmup jumps
because I didn't want to make Reno's feet too sore. I did gallop around quite a bit, which I had hoped would help him settle some as he was quite wild when we was jumping in warmups and was really wrestling with me. But he's very fit so the galloping didn't take any of the edge off. When I got on course, he became nearly unmanageable, dragging me to the fences. I would have preferred to work on going around the course closer the way you would in show jumping because the riding styles are different, with a slower pace in show jumping to produce a more careful jump, as extra practice after having a rail down, but Reno was having none of that and was running through my hands. On cross country you want them to be excited to go and looking for the jumps but it's also important that they listen to you when you ask them to, which normally Reno does well. But he had taken over the decision making, and while we had managed to jump all the jumps and squeeze in just barely above the speed fault time, I wasn't thrilled about my lack of brakes. I'm pretty sure that he was having flashbacks to the last time we were at Indiana for the classic three-day, where the steeplechase was faster than we'd ever gone on cross country before and the cross country course was at the maximum speed for Novice over the most difficult and technical Novice course I've seen, so we were able to go a lot faster than we were this weekend. The course was also very short, so it gave us even less time to settle in to a rhythm. Before AEC, we have work to do in all three phases so that we can have a better performance there.
American Eventing Championship
The big weekend was finally here, the American Eventing Championship 2021. I started at my new co-op in
between Hoosier and AEC, which is in Cincinnati, but because Reno is sensitive and has proven in the past to be uncomfortable moving barns, he is staying in Columbus. I've been driving back and forth every few days to keep training, but the situation is less than ideal, especially since I'd been hoping to work remotely this semester like I had in January for the company. However, the company said no when I asked if that was a possibility. Madeline had been riding my horse some, which has been helpful, but I still felt a little underprepared, especially since the show in Indiana hadn't fully put the Champagne Run demons to bed. But we've really been working on getting Reno pushing up underneath himself so he has more power and collecting him more to a closer spot to the jumps where he might feel more comfortable. He's older, and I'm starting to figure out that I need to adjust my riding style from what I've done in the past with him because he is less confident than he was a few years ago. I need to ride better, so I've been working on my accuracy to the jumps to help make it easier for him to jump clear. We rode on Thursday, Friday, and Saturday, and I was given permission to work from home on Monday and Tuesday so that I could train and help pack before we left on Wednesday. The Kentucky Horse Park is familiar territory because it's the place we show most often, but both times I've been here this year, for Spring Bay in April and Champagne Run in July, I've had a major problem in the show jumping, so I wasn't exactly bursting with confidence when we arrived. Luckily the show jumping was held in the Rolex Arena, the big stadium where the Horse Park's seminal event, the Kentucky Five-Star Event, the highest-level eventing competition in the United States, does their dressage and show jumping, which is a place where Reno and I have done well, at the 2019 AEC where we jumped one of just a few double clears that sent us leaps and bounds up the leaderboard to finish just into the ribbons in 15th. It's an environment that might make some horses nervous, but I'm just glad it's not in the same arena where we've show jumped for the last two shows here. We met our farrier after we'd gotten settled into our stalls and he did all three of our show horses' feet, making them special shoes because they all have terrible feet. He told me that because Reno's soles are so thin it would be beneficial to put back shoes on him. For context, Reno hasn't had back shoes on for more than 10 years; the entire time I've been riding with Madeline, he's been barefoot in the rear and shod in the front. He interferes with himself in the rear, so there was a concern about him cutting himself up if we put metal shoes on his back feet. But our farrier, who is one of the best in the business, thus why we use him even though he lives in Lexington, insisted that it would help him with his hoof problems, so I agreed to it, since he knows a lot more than I do about horseshoeing. He also put pads in the front to provide extra support. I did my pre-ride right after he finished, and he felt fine. Not super, but okay. I will say that it's not a great idea to make such a drastic change right before a show, but because of our farrier situation, we didn't have a ton of choice in the matter. His balance had changed but the farrier assured me he would get used to it.
Thursday was dressage day. Both of Madeline's horses went before me. Landtino sucked back behind the leg,
something he has a tendency to do sometimes. He has some dressage issues because he was abused by a high-level dressage rider when he was young - he was pushed too far too fast. Even though he is 21 now and long since removed from that situation, he still gets anxious in the dressage sometimes, and that happened during Madeline's test, but the judges didn't kill her for it. Drummer, who won his class here in 2019, was the more likely one to be competitive anyway. Unfortunately, during his second canter circle, a dump truck dropped a load somewhere not too far arena from their arena and he spooked, which dropped his score. To be fair, he was still in third in a class of over 50, but he could have been winning without the spook. Reno was in the middle of the afternoon, but luckily the weather was good, not too hot considering it was August. He was pretty relaxed in warmup but I could feel that he wasn't used to his new hind shoes yet and his balance wasn't quite right. I knew that we'd both have to suck it up and deal with it, so I went into the dressage arena feeling pretty good. Overall I felt like the test went well, nicely forward with a few mistakes that normally we don't make, like a step of canter in one of our trot circles. I came out of the arena thinking I would be in the 33 or 34 range, knowing that the judges at championships, where we have two judges instead of our normal one, can be a little tougher than for a regular show where I may have gotten a 32 for the same test. Regardless I knew it was a much better test than last time we were at the AEC and scored a 41.2 and I was happy with the work that Reno had done. So when the scores were released I was unpleasantly surprised, and I know that a lot of other people in my class were as well. One of the judges had given me a 30.2, a score that I would have been thrilled with any day and would have put me comfortably into the top twenty. The other judge had given me a 41.9. The two scores averaged to give me a 36.1 in a tie for 34th out of 53. A lot of events use two judges and I've never seen that big of a disparity in scores before, and mine wasn't even the worst one. A few people had 15+ point differences. In fact, the only horse in the entire class of 53 horses that this judge scored higher than the other judge, whose range of scores were typical for the level, was the horse in first, which she gave a score below 20, a absolute absurdity. There's nothing that the officials could do after the class had gone but I know people besides me noticed and I have to wonder if she'll ever be invited back to judge at the Horse Park again. I know that judging is biased by nature so it's impossible for it to be perfectly fair to everyone, but this defied anything I've seen and I know a lot of people felt the same way. But there was nothing we could do about it so we moved on to cross country day. At least the "normal" judge, who actually is a pretty high level judge who works at some prestigious events, had some very nice things to say about Reno and my ride, so that was encouraging.
I didn't ride until late in the day on Thursday so I had plenty of time to walk my course a few more times. I
didn't need to do it as many times as I did because, disappointingly, it was nearly exactly the same course as we had done at the 2019 AEC with just a few jumps swapped in position so there wasn't a ton of thinking involved. Madeline rode both of her horses in the morning so I was able to watch them both. They were both good as usual and jumped double clear, which moved Landtino up just a few spots and kept Drummer in third. From what I saw, very few people were having trouble with the course; for what should have been the most difficult course of the year because this was the national championship, it was really very straightforward. I walked multiple times to get a feel for where my minute markers should have been since I was in a tie, which is broken by the person who is closest to the optimum time without going over on cross country. Luckily the speed was set at the maximum for the level which would make that a little easier for me if Reno was strong again like he was at Indiana. The ground was much better than it was at Indiana. Since Madeline rode early and I rode late, we actually had quite a bit of free time in the middle of the day, which is unusual as we are typically crazy busy all day at a show. We went to a cute local restaurant for lunch and walked our horses around the grounds when we got back. While we were walking, Boyd Martin, who is fresh from a trip to the Olympics, said hello to us, which really exemplified the magnitude of this show, which was the largest ever held in the US. It was crazy to be able to say hello to an Olympian, though I will say this isn't the first time I've been around them since I've been to two other AECs in 2016 at Tryon in North Carolina and 2019 at the Horse Park. In fact, in 2016 I was in the background riding in a promotional video Boyd was filming (it's easy to recognize Reno, he sticks out in a crowd with his coat pattern), so I can say that I've photobombed an Olympian. Finally after waiting and waiting all day I was ready to tack up and warm up for cross country. Reno was still strong but once we got on course, he actually responded to me and was listening to what I was asking from him, which was a great feeling. It was a really nice ride. I did make a circle between the last two jumps to kill a little time to get close to the optimum time, and I did end up breaking my tie successfully. Since the course wasn't that hard, not many people had problems, so I only moved up a few spots to 27th. That evening was the competitor party, so we stayed to watch some of the show jumping finale of the Advanced, which is the highest national level. We didn't stay the whole time because it ended late and Madeline was going to be the first on course the next morning with Landtino at 7:30 sharp.
Whoever made the schedule for show jumping day did not like our group much. Madeline was in the first
class of the day, which started at 7:30 in the morning, and I was in the last class, which didn't start until 6 in the evening. For championships like this, show jumping runs in reverse order of placing, so the horse in first is the last one to go. Since Madeline had two horses, she was allowed to ride out of order with Landtino so that she would have time to get on Drummer and warm him up before he had to go. It was still a hassle because the Rolex Stadium is far away from the barns, so we had to walk Drummer over and use my jumping saddle for Landtino so she could just hop off him and get straight on Drummer. Unfortunately the pressure and rush got to her and Landtino and she had a very ugly rail in the middle of the course that threw her off her line to the next jump and she had to circle in between them, incurring a penalty for crossing her tracks and time penalties for exceeding the optimum time, putting her out of the ribbons with him. But she shook it off for Drummer and jumped clear, finishing in third. Like the cross country, the show jumping did not really have much of a "championship feel", which was surprising because in 2019, the show jumping was very difficult, which was what allowed me to jump almost 30 places in the final placing to be in 15th when I finished on my (crappy) dressage score. That course had been beautifully decorated, with challenging lines and every fence at the maximum height and spread. The course for this show could have been transplanted to any other show and wouldn't have felt out of place. It was disappointing to see the number of corners that were cut to maximize the profits the show made; the whole weekend lacked the "championship feel" that the other two AECs, even Tryon, which wasn't finished being built in 2016, had. Even Madeline's prizes for coming in third were mostly discount cards and free stuff that nobody would have picked out given the choice. It was fun to browse the vendor tents with her collecting her prizes, and it gave me something to do besides worry about show jumping all day long. Going late in the day when you're nervous is no fun! I walked the course during the breaks between classes, watched some horses go, caught up with some friends, and tried to distract myself until it was time to go.
Reno is nervous in traffic and the initial warmup arena was very crowded when I got there. I checked in with
the ring steward and went to an empty lunging area nearby to gallop around alone as the beginning of my warmup. When I knew that I would be close to being sent to the final warmup, I went back and jumped a few fences. Reno had been very quiet and almost lazy while I was galloping, so I was worried because it had been that casualness that had caught us out this season. Madeline assured me that he would pick up when we were in that big arena with all of its atmosphere, but as it turned out I had nothing to worry about because he perked right up when we started jumping. I did more warmup jumps than I had been doing in the hopes that it would help keep the adrenaline up so we would pick up his feet once we got in the arena. I knew that if there was going to be a problem, the most likely place for it to happen would be at the first oxer (a fence with a spread) because that was where it had been at Cobblestone and Indiana. This was the second jump. I got into the arena, marveled a little at the awesome experience of being in there and seeing my name and my horse's name on the jumbotron, and picked up a canter, pushing it forward then collecting to get the best possible balance. Reno jumped the first fence perfectly, and as we turned to the second fence, the first oxer, I revved him up and... well he cleared it, but not without panicking his rider by giving it a nice hard rub. The rail stayed in place and that gave him the reminder he needed to pick up his feet and clear the next fences with room to spare. I was careful with my line to the fence that had given Madeline and Landtino trouble, and I was so relieved coming through the finish flags with a double clear. As I was coming out of the arena, the stewards asked me to stay around just in case enough people had problems that we might be in the ribbons. At the last AECs I was in 31st after cross country and ended up placing, so I did hang around for a few horses, but most people were jumping clear and it was late already so we left. I ended up finishing in 18th, just outside the ribbons. (Now if we hadn't had such a terrible judge, that would have been different - the 30.2 the other judge gave me would have been 6th.) I was disappointed because I had really wanted to improve on my placing from 2019 and I knew that the dressage had been significantly better this time than before, but I felt like Reno had stepped up after a tough season and given his all this weekend, so I was happy with him. Honestly, the whole AEC experience felt stripped of its glory, but it was still fun, and I felt like we had a quality performance in every phase, so I couldn't ask for more than that.
Reflection
My self-designed experience followed my preparation and show season leading up to the biggest event of the
year, the American Eventing Championship in Lexington, Kentucky. During the months of July and August, I trained my horse, Reno, and competed in four shows including the AEC.
This was our first full show season since the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, so it looked different than we
had seen before, and my experience ended up being different than my original plan (this is a year in the making- I first submitted and had it approved in March 2020, just a few weeks before campus was closed). I was taking classes online for most of the time period, though I did start my fourth co-op rotation in Cincinnati in mid-August, which made the last few weeks of the experience more difficult since I kept my horse in Columbus and had to travel back and forth quite a bit.
My experience goal was to progress in my creativity in my training methods, which I was able to do
throughout the timeframe of the experience. After each show I adjusted my training schedule and the work that I was doing to focus on any areas of improvement that we had identified. Being flexible in my training was helpful in my progression as a rider. I also learned to be okay with the ups and downs that come with horses, and while we did have some significant highs this season - a win at the first show that I went to during the experience was great - and really saw an improvement in the consistency of our dressage, we also had some new problems in show jumping that were new for us. I had to work through the frustration to identify the problem and try different ways to fix it. We were rewarded for this effort with an awesome clear round at the American Eventing Championship, and I really felt like Reno deserved to have placed at least in the top fifteen even though one of the dressage judges disagreed with my assessment of how our test went. I was still happy with the performance and felt like we put our best foot forward at the biggest show of the year. I grew as a rider, adding more training tools to my repertoire that I can use in the future, and I strengthened my connection with my horse, which is valuable to me.
My personal goals were to become more connected with the equestrian community and to work on my
leadership skills by taking initiative. I was able to connect with more people in the equestrian community this show season, though it was still difficult with pandemic restrictions in place. I did get to see a little bit of the ugly side of the community when I helped sell a horse at our barn, which was a good reminder of why I plan on staying an amateur and riding horses as a recreational activity instead of being involved in a professional capacity. I took initiative by making most of my training decisions myself, though I recognize that my trainer has more experience than I do and still looked to her and other professionals such as my vet for advice when I was not sure what path to take with my horse.
Overall, I felt like the experience was valuable for my growth as a rider and a person. I had to be dedicated
and creative in my training, even when circumstances were not favorable. I especially enjoyed the fact that I had the chance to share my experience with the people who were directly involved, including my barn friends, family, and trainer, all of whom were very important to the journey I have taken as a rider throughout the ten years I have been doing this. Getting to share it with them was great. I also strengthened my connection with Reno, both when our training and shows went well and when things did not go to plan. We both learned a lot over the course of the experience, and I cannot wait to continue to work with Reno and apply what I have learned to other horses and to other aspects of my life.
