Year End Award Summary 2012

What a great year it was for the Smart Start Stable Horses!   Jaantje topped the barn with the highest year end award as National Reserve Champion Training Level in the Irish Draught Horse Society of North America!!!  She is owned by Kris & Greg Robinson and was ridden by Kris and Suzette.

For year end awards in the United States Equestrian Federation, Safarr was named Champion for Region X in Purebred Arabian in both 4th Level and FEI Combined levels.

Next in the placings was Angelina JBM and Lanie Meese with a Region X Arabian Reserve Champion Training Level Amateur and a 6th place in the Training Level Open division.

Desiderata Rose, owned by Cindy Anderson and ridden by Kari Schmitt placed 4th in the Region X Half Arabian Training Level and 5th in the Region X Half Arabian 1st Level.

Congratulations to Everyone!

 

Upcoming Clinic — March 24, 2012

We’ve finally set a date to have a clinic!!  It’s going to be Saturday March 24, 2012.  The theme will be Better Horse –Better Rider,  Better Rider–Better Horse.   Learn to do things you never thought you or your horse could do!  We will focus on a Half Halt the rider can understand, Getting a Better Stop (which is the basis of a better half halt), Getting Better Connection to the Bit and Improving the Gaits of the Horse.  As always, if ground work is needed or wanted, which always helps the under saddle work, we’ll be working on Respect from the Horse on the Ground.  This can cover anything from leading to having the horse respect your space to standing for the farrier to “parallel parking” your horse for mounting.

We work with any breed of horse for any discipline.  Although we specialize in dressage we can help gaited horses improve their gaits, trail horses be more responsive and safe on the trail, show horses in classes like western pleasure, hunter pleasure, etc, be softer and more brilliant in their work.

We work each horse/person pair at our clinic where we feel they will benefit most and/or where they want to work.  Our methods apply to all horses of all disciplines as we strive to teach the horse from the horse’s point of view, the person to work to understand how this works and the horse/person combination to work together to be better at everything they do.

So, anyone is welcome to come with anything they need help with!!

The clinic will start at 9:00 with a demonstration of some of the things we will be covering that day.  We will pick horses for the demo that will show what the horses in the clinic will be striving for.  We believe that a picture is worth a thousand words so if we can demonstrate what the clinicees (I don’t think that’s really a word) can see what they’re aiming for it will be easier for them to work on their horse to achieve it.

Cost for the clinic will be $125, which will include a stall.  It is $20 to audit.  There is a limit of 8 horses for the day.  Often we work with the horse/person in the morning and again in the afternoon as the horse figures things out in that break time and comes back ready to build on what they learned in the morning but it’s always dependent on each horse.  Lunch is provided and the arena and barn are heated!

Details will be coming on the website so keep checking but we wanted to get the word out so you can save the date!

Krystal 1/15/12

Krystal’s had a great few weeks since the last post on the blog.  On the warmest day this week, when it got to nearly 50 degrees, she and I went on a trail ride.  We were the first ones to trail ride this year!  It was an absolute success.  We did about 5 minutes of ground work in the indoor and then went outside and got on.  We rode out around the dressage ring by the other horses, out past the shop, across the soybean field, came back along the fenceline, walked through some snow that had been a drift and was the only snow spot left in the field, rode out the back driveway to the woods and then back home.  She walked past Mary’s two horses and donkey and stayed right on the trail, even when the donkey started heading her way to check her out!  She was very careful to watch where she was walking and what she was doing but not in a spooky, scared way, in a cautious way.

On Thursday Rick got on and rode Krystal for about 10 minutes at the end of our ride.  He hadn’t been on her for about 6 months.  He was happy with how she was doing and as he started playing around on her he started working on her leg yields!   It was quite different for her to start putting more pieces together but she worked at it and did great.  I was almost to the point of thinking I needed a whip to back up my leg a bit when the work got a bit more difficult but Rick worked on her forward while doing those harder exercises and she was immensely different the next day when I rode her.

Cordia Pearson, our saddlefitter, checked Krystal’s saddle fit Saturday and her back has changed yet again, in a good way, so she’s now using Safarr’s old L&R Berkely.  She changes saddles about every 3 wks so it’s a good thing I didn’t sell any of my old ones!  George is back in his dressage saddle after needing the Meleeta western saddle for several months, and Obie, Rick & Kari’s TB moved out of Kari’s Meleeta and into my Laser.  Safarr’s Concorde is still fitting him nicely.  That’s the downside of being able to build back muscle quickly in the horses with the exercises we do, they outgrow their saddles sometimes.  Since Nov 1 Krystal has been in the Meleeta, Rick’s L&R Ellipse for his WB mare, George’s Ellipse, back to Rick’s Ellipse and now Safarr’s Berkley.  Cordia thinks Krystal will most likely go through every saddle I own by the end of this show season!  Lucky for us Cordia has a horse in training here so we can have saddle fit checked whenever we think it needs to be looked at.

Krystal’s improvement in the last month is keeping us on track for her to hit the show ring right away this spring!!  She’s cantering around the arena now and thinking she’s pretty brave.  With any luck we’ll just keep moving forward!

Krystal 12/20/11

Holy mackerel, it’s been almost 4 months since I last posted on Krystal!!  She’s doing super!!

Krystal had some time off during our trip to Sport Horse Nationals in September and during combining season in October.  I’ve been working her pretty much 4-5 days/wk since then.  I started really slow, just doing 10-15 minutes of ground work the first few sessions.  Confidence is her weakest point.  Her fear is mainly from her own body, most likely from that first girthing, whether it be saddling or a surcingle, and her reaction is to tighten up, which naturally scares her more.  The ground work helps so much and is much safer for me.  I am to the point where I can push her to respond faster, she canters without tightening up and stopping herself from bucking and this week I can get her to canter from the walk and turn and canter off the other way.  She isn’t quite soft enough to do a rollback yet but it’s coming.

Have been working her over a “pinwheel” of 4 ground poles.  It’s been helping lots.  It helps distract her from her internal fears as she also has to pay attention to her feet or she trips on the poles.  For a couple weeks I would ride and if she got too worried about something I would go around the pinwheel a few times and she would relax and soften and off we would go to the easier work of going around the arena w/o the poles.

The week before last I started cantering her again and yesterday I cantered down the long side & around the arena, several rounds in each direction!  She’s getting more comfortable with all the work.  I’ve been doing some “clockwork”, putting her front foot in a specific direction using only one rein.  The first few days backing was pretty touchy, she was a bit “bound up” and I had to be careful to let her sort it out and relax and back.  After a couple days she was backing freely and now I can add some energy to get her to back faster and she stills stays soft.  Backing is a tricky thing with horses who have a bucking problem.  They can get bound up and explode as they don’t know what to do with the energy and it’s blocked.  They’re locked in their body and their brain.  Fear can do some really dangerous things to horses and consequently, us.  I also found in the ground work that Krystal thought it was totally wrong to side pass over a pole.  The front and back of the horse must be on the same side of the pole in her world  She found out that wasn’t true and now I’m starting to add some speed to her side passing on the ground.  Last week we started the side pass under saddle and once she figured it out she thought it was fine.

When I started back in on Krystal after combining she had put on lots of weight.  Turns out the western saddle didn’t fit her.  Put on George’s L&R Ellipse.  That worked for about 3 wks.  She’s getting more fit so now she’s in Rick’s L&R Ellipse he has for Chivonne.  Cordia figures Krystal will go through all of my saddles by the end of summer with her changing back as she gets in shape and stronger.  We’re hoping she ends up in Safarr’s old L&R Berkley since he outgrew that after 5 years and had to get a new one.  That’s the downside of getting the horse’s backs to get stronger all the time. Always changing/getting stronger!

I’m still very careful not to push her too far.  The wrong pressure at the wrong time could still have bad consequences BUT it’s getting farther away and would take a bigger stressor to have it come out.  Krystal’s becoming more like a “trained horse” every day!

(OK I’m trying to get this to post to FB today, let’s see if it works this time)

SHN Show Day 3

Last day for us at the show.  Everything is packed up except the horses and their water buckets.  Will be up super early, earlier than we had to get up for all the 8 am rides, hoping to be loaded and headed out by 6:00.

Started the day out with Sara’s training level ride.  She did great.  She moved with much power!  It was cold and the skies were grey.  It’s tricky on a day like today to push the horse to really give it all and yet have them work hard not blow it.  It’s natural for horses to be uptight in weather like this.  This “on guard” attitude is what has kept them alive since the beginning of time.  Sara came through with flying colors.

Kizzes went next at 11:30.  By now the wind was blowing.  When she came down the ramp and entered the stadium the flags were blowing and flapping and of course, they were right down by A in arena 3, the one she had to show in.  She did great in her test until the canter.  She added way more to the test than need be, and got really tight.  She did her flying change way to early, when she was supposed to be half passing, in fact.  She went sideways in the medium canter down the long side, well, not sideways, but at a 45 degree angle, but really held it together pretty good for the next half pass and flying change and actually did a pretty good medium canter, down center line, trot and halt.  Because she didn’t do the flying change in the right place one judge gave her a 0, my first 0 I believe, but her scores took the whole range from 0 to 8!  Needless to say she didn’t place in the top ten but both judges had huge grins on their face when we finished, a thumbs up from one.  I was glad they allowed us to keep going, I sure didn’t want her to have to quit the test in the middle after her such an ordeal.  She needed to finish the test.  Judges all have to have ridden successfully to certain levels, depending on their rating, so they all know that sometimes horses will be horses and we, as riders, need to work through and help them learn to be better.   The judges had humorous, encouraging comments.  Kizzes, of course, was all fine by the end, free walking out of the arena on a long rein as though her ride had been a “sleeper”.

Kaluah rode about 3:30.   Unfortunately she had started to tie up yesterday so she wasn’t 100%.  We had treated her and she was  pretty much back to normal, but when she had to ride all alone in ring 2, all other rings on break, no other horses down there, cold, wind, she was a little nervous.  She worked nicely but the top 3 scores were above 70% so that’s hard to beat with all that working against her.  She’s looking pretty good after the ride and this evening so she should be fine.

So, no ribbons today.  I’ve always said that the national shows are really tough and if we have just one horse in the barn get a Top Ten, we’ve had a great show!  We came home with TWO!!!

Looking forward to heading home.  We’ll be working on what we’re going to do for our lecture/demo at the Minnesota Equifest October 15 and 16th at the Minnesota State Fairgrounds…..

 

SHN Show Day 2

Two Top Tens!!!  Kari and Ra “smoked” and got a 66 in Second Level making the Top Ten!!  They rode at 8:07 in the morning and had to wait until after 1:00 before all the scores were posted for the class.  She was in first place when there were 12 scores  left to post. still in first with 6 scores left to post.  It wasn’t until they posted the last 6 scores that 3 riders scored higher and knocked them out of the Champion position.  What a great score and great placing!!

Kizzes rode her 2nd level ride and did great!  It was the first show she had been to since a year ago August and the first time she rode the new tests in the show ring.  She was doing great until she came out of the counter canter and swapped her hind lead.  It messed up her medium canter and made her a bit tight in her next 10m circle.  Too many places to get counted down.  The rest of the test was great but it kept her out of the top ten.  We all were very proud of Kizzes to have such a good ride after such a long time out of the show ring.

Safarr went in and, using Rick’s suggestions for tweaking the “rider”–that would be me– he had his best 4th level ride ever!  He actually got comments his canter pirouettes were too small for 4th level which made it harder for him to do it better.  He also got 6s on his flying diagonal changes!!  He was quite proud of himself.  (I was proud of him too)  He made the Top Ten!

We finished the night off with the Progressive Barn party.  Great food, great beverages.  Joanne wanted to do the karaoke in barn 4 but we were running out of energy quickly.  We tucked the horses in and headed back to our motel.  Early ride on Sara in the morning, 8:21, have to get to bed early.  Kizzes does 3rd level around 11 something and Kaluah goes after 3:00

SHN Show Day 1

No ribbons today;-((  Sara was first up and had her best 1st level ride ever.  It was wonderful!  It was only the fourth time she had ridden 1st level test 3, it was really good!  She placed 18th in the class of 38!!!  Kaluah went about 4 hours later.  She warmed up wonderfully.  When she got in the arena she got worried so she was a bit tight and whinnied a couple times before her test started and when she was done.  She still did a great job and placed in the class right behind Sara in 19th place.

Safarr didn’t ride till 5:00.  He warmed up really pretty nicely.  He did great in his trot work but when he got to the walk he decided the walk should be more like a stroll.  unfortunately he had to do walk pirouettes…  He didn’t do the best one the first directions but he redeemed himself on the second one and got a 7 from one judge and a 6 from the other.  When it was time to canter I didn’t collect him soon enough for the walk-canter transition so it affected the whole rest of the test.  He did get a 6 on his first canter pirouette!  I know PSG is a stretch and we’re still working on figuring it out but if I don’t ride it I won’t learn it and I’ve NEVER been one to ride one or two levels above what I show at.  I just don’t have the patience to wait   Needless to say, we didn’t place ;-(

Tomorrow Ra goes at 8:07 and Kizzes follows in the same class at 9:12 or so, they’re doing 2nd level.  Safarr is doing 4th level around 1:46.  Maybe tomorrow we’ll get a ribbon?  Wish us luck!  You can do all the training and have your horse really ready and yet there’s lots of luck involved with having all the pieces come together for that one ride.

SHN Day 3

Amazing how time flies.  We spent all day preparing the horses for the first rides tomorrow.  Didn’t get the sign and pictures up on the tack stall until 5:30.

First we walked the horses (after feeding them and then eating at McDs– coffee really hit the spot today).  Started riding, Ra and Safarr first.  Ra’s feeling good as is Safarr.  Safarr and I are starting to get Prix St George figured out.  We need tons more practice and honing in on our timing but the pieces are starting to fall into place.  Too bad nationals isn’t 6 months from now   I swear I am the slowest learner ever born.  Poor Safarr, sometimes I wonder why he puts up with me.

Next up was Kari on Kaluah and me on Kizzes.  Kizzes did pretty good.  She’s feeling better than she has all year.  Too bad nationals isn’t 6 months from now )  Kaluah was a bit nervous out there, she and Kari worked quite a while on getting her to relax in her job.  There are 3 rings in front of the grandstand so it’s very busy.  The crew was setting up some of the rings, they were coming in with forklifts to set the judge’s booths, it was high energy.  So all in all they did great for so much going on.

Went to lunch at Subway.  Kari needed refueling as she had more riding to do.   12″ sub should do the trick!  Came back to the grounds and Kari rode Sara (Desiderata Rose in the program).  Sara has been amazing at adjusting to such a big, high test show.  She did her job, many, many horses  working in the Rolex arena in front of that big grandstand.  Joanne and I went to the show office first to check in while Cindy and Rick watched Kari work Sara.  Joanne and I called Rick to pick us up with the lifesaving golf cart and we watched Sara work too.  She’s doing great!

Kari went back out to work Kaluah and she was a totally different horse.  Came “out of the box” (out of her stall) like her old self.  They went to the show arenas, did a light workout and returned to the stall happy and relaxed.  I took Safarr (led him, me walking, believe it or not)  all the way back to the show arena as he hadn’t seen it with the judge’s boxes in place.  I didn’t want to say he didn’t make top ten because I was too lazy to take him back up to see the arenas with the judge’s booths in place to check them out.  He’d probably be fine but it’s nationals, this is it, set it up for success.   It’s not just another opportunity to train for “the big show”.

Tucked all the horses in for the night, put fuel in the truck on the way back to the motel (when it shut off at $75 I got mad and didn’t start it again,,, decided we’d have to fill before we left anyway.  Who can fill their truck on $75 anyway????!!  I don’t understand why they put shut off limits on diesel fuel pumps.)  I still marvel at how seldom we stop for fuel compared to the Ford.  We averaged 10 mpg pulling the trailer with 5 horses, a golf cart, 40 bags of sawdust, 20 bales of hay and all our stuff.

Joanne wanted us to eat at Chic Fil A.  Turned out to be a winner!!!!!  The grilled chicken sandwich is cheaper than Burger King and better!  We may just try it again.

Well, tomorrow’s Big Day One.  Sara’s up first just after 8, then Kaluah just before noon and then Safarr just after 5 in Prix St George.  Wish us luck.  No matter how good you and your horse are, there’s TONS of luck involved to have a good ride at such an important show…

SHN Day 2

Rain, of course, all morning.  We managed to not get too wet but did have to wait in the trailer 5 minutes before loading the horses to go to the Kentucky Horse Park.  We drove to the overnight, fed the horses and went to a Waffle House.  We had never been to a Waffle House before, been trying to live dangerously this year, so trying new things   It was good.  Tried some of Joanne’s grits, they were pretty good.

Went to the horse park, bedded the stalls, found out they hadn’t given us a tack stall, went back and got a stall across from ours to use,  and went to get the horses from their hotel.  Of course it started raining harder when it was time to load up but we waited 5 minutes or so and the rain slowed so we quickly got them in the trailer and headed out.  It was lightly raining when we unloaded them and by the time we got done unloading the trailer it was done raining.  We got everything unloaded and sorted in 2 1/2 hourss.  We still have to put up our sign and pics but the rest is all done.  The weather got better and better as the afternoon went on.  When we looked at the radar on our phones it was pretty much rain over Lexington all morning.

Fed the horses their supper and went to McD for a “snack” and Tractor Supply to get a chain for Sara’s stall door  to make sure she didn’t escape from her stall, her latch was not Sara proof.  Rick also looked at some fun, funky sunglasses but chickened out on buying them so I did.  He’s going to squint and I’m going to look really “in”  with the cool people.

Saddled up the horses to get them out to stretch and see the warm up rings.  WOW, the Kentucky Horse Park is much improved since we were here 2 years ago.  At that time they were working on getting ready for the World Games last year, now it’s done.  We get to ride all tests in front of the Rolex grandstand.  All 3 rings are in front of the grandstand.  It’s HUGE!  It’s a long way from the barns, it takes 10 minutes to ride from our barn to the warm up rings.

Sara was like an old pro.  It’s the 6th show she’s ever been to and she’s only 6 yrs old.  You sure can tell she was started at Smart Start.  We wondered if she wasn’t feeling well she was so good and at home with everything.  Safarr, on the other hand, was good walking to the warm up ring until we got to the area he hadn’t seen before, the Rolex Stadium.  The life-size statue of the horse coming off a jump was something that really caught his eye!  He was really good but he was trying so hard to be a Looky Lucy instead of Mr Focus.  You can fix a horse but every now and then you see glimpses of their old problems.  All manageable but you can see it.  He spooked at a big stump by the side of the road but when I asked him to step up onto it he made believe it was something on the other side of the stump he was looking at.  He knew right away I was asking him to step up on the stump, which he did, both front feet, because we did this many years ago on a trail ride up in Cushing.  That day in Cushing,  it was a big stump, so big he could have put all four feet on it if I wanted him to (but it had a rotten spot in the middle I was afraid he could step into and get caught).  I ground worked him and got him to step up, both front feet on it.  He never forgot what he learned that day and what it was about.

Kari got on Kaluah and headed out and I got on Kizzes.  Kizzes actually got more relaxed up by the Rolex Stadium.  Kaluah was more like Safarr was when Kizzes and I arrived but by the time she and Kari got done she was in the groove pretty good for first night stretching.  Kizzes feels better than she has in a long time.  She hasn’t shown this year so it’ll be interesting to see how she does doing the new tests at nationals and her only show this year!  She and Kaluah walked back to the barn on a long rein.  Actually, Cindy led Kaluah most of the way back as Kari had to get Ra up to the warm up ring before dark and needed to get back quickly.  I, of course, rode

Ra had no worries.  Being a three time national top ten in trail class gives a few perks to new stuff.  She just needed some stretching and loosening up.

Sounds like the weather for the week has only 20% chance of rain.  Not that we don’t plan on getting wet, BUT, shouldn’t, hopefully, fingers crossed, be a total wash out.

Tomorrow, no classes!  Plan to ride in the morning, hopefully it’s not too busy in the warm up.  We may take them out again later just for some stretching, loosening stuff, but want to get the focus work done in the morning.  We start bright and early on Wednesday…

 

Sport Horse Nationals 2011 – Day 1

Made it safe and sound in Lexington.  Horses are tucked in for the night at a horse hotel (Foxtrot Farm) south east of the Kentucky Horse Park, we’re in a motel (Winner’s Circle) north east of the Horse Park in Georgetown.  Both are within a 10 minute drive from the park but unfortunately in different directions.  That’s OK though, we’ll be moving the horses to the park tomorrow, check in is at noon.  In 2009 we were able to do early arrival and get to the horse park on Saturday.   Found out last week – no early arrival this year.  Got lucky and found Foxtrot.  It has huge cement block stalls, great, secure, safe doors, nice alley way, good air flow and straw knee deep for the horses to sleep in.

We left at 12:30 am today (Sunday).  We arrived at Foxtrot at 3:30 CST.  We had pretty good driving, no major problems.  Stopped for about an hour around 8 am for breakfast and to let the horses rest.  It was 44 degrees when we left, got down to 37 and stayed cool until just north of Louisville, KY.  Had a major slow down crossing the Ohio River in Louisville as one of the interstate bridges was closed and it all ends up where we wanted to go.  When we arrived it was 80 degrees.  We stopped between Louisville & Lexington to open the trailer up for more airflow.  It rained lightly for at least 3 hrs in Indiana.  Not a hard rain but enough to make it hard to see clearly.  It was foggy on and off all the way down.

Kizzes hasn’t been to a show all year so she’s pretty happy to be in the trailer.  Safarr and Ra were happy to get to go to a show but had that resigned to a long haul look fairly early in the ride.  Kaluah was a bit worried at first but was still pretty happy to be travelling.  Sara, our new to showing horse is taking it all in but totally relaxed about it all.  She seems to want to act like a big girl, like it’s all no big deal, since that’s how all the other horses are about it.

Toughest thing, besides all the driving, at night and in the rain, (thanks to Rick for doing 98% of the driving) was getting fuel.  Every time we would stop we would see the next station at 5 cents/gal cheaper.  One time we went east off the interstate as it was foggy and we couldn’t see for sure what was west and it was 10 cents/gal cheaper where we didn’t go.  Fuel got cheaper as we got to southern Wisconsin, better the further south we went.  We have the highest prices anywhere we’ve travelled (except Canada, of course).  Don’t know what we’d do without “The Next Exit” book which has a list of all services at every exit on the interstate system in every state and my Garmin on my laptop.  Between the two we can find just about everything we need.  Maybe I should find the app with the cheapest fuel prices?  Our main concern is to find a place that we can get the truck and trailer in and out of.

That Chevy sure gets better mileage than the Ford did.  I was constantly asking Rick how much fuel we had (rule is never less than 1/4 tank) and still having enough to drive longer.  We had Homer to check off miles for us (It’s been a tradition since 2003 when my son gave me a Homer Simpson Burger King watch for the trip — Bart & Lisa say “Are we there yet?” and Homer says “No” and they repeat it.  We push the button once for each 100 miles so by the time we got to 800 miles we had Homer saying NO 16 times.  His speech was a little rusty the first round but was good as new within a couple hundred miles.

Ate at the Golden Corral, they had cotton candy!!  And lots of other good food too!  Let Rick rest in the motel while we gals went to tuck the horses in.  (OH, forgot to add, Cindy and Joanne drove along with us!)  Had a great time singing along to Neil Sedaka’s song “Breaking Up is Hard to Do” on the way back to the motel.  Need to make a playlist for the iPhone of great sing alongs

Pick up an hour of sleep from the time change so we’ll head out to feed the horses, eat breakfast, hook on, load up and be to the Kentucky Horse Park around noon to unload and do some easy, stretching out rides on the horses.  That’s pretty much the day’s plan.  Hopefully it’ll all go without a hitch?!