Because the pace was in Larkspur, a two hour drive away, we had to leave the barn at 5:30am so we could do a course walk at the farm hosting the event.
Highboy galloped well, but had to stop and look at nearly every fence, then jump it out of a standstill. He crossed the water and jumped down the banks despite having limited experience with those types of obstacles. Towards the end of the course there was a group of log fences with a few strides and good hills in between. Due to the gymnastic work Highboy and I have been doing this summer he was foot-perfect through that portion of the course. It gives me information about what to work on next with him. We've done galloping, which he loves. We've done gymnastic jumping, which he loves. Next he needs to learn how to jump out of his gallop. When he puts all the pieces together he is going to be phenomenal.
The GoPro video from my helmet camera on Highboy's ride can be seen here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwsjiHjbSy8&edit=vd
Next from our barn went team Bit of Honey Bees, consisting of Jasi with Cosmo, Carol on Shambhu, Joan with Darby, and Alice with Beauty. The horses were a little excited because of the environment and all the energy in the air, so they walked and trotted the course. This was Joan and Alice's first pair pace. They had a fun time and rode it well!
A portion of Cosmo and Jasi's ride from the GoPro can be seen here:
https://youtu.be/yhm_kejalCs
The final group from Bit of Honey to go was Hot Flashes. Kim H. rode her mare Rain, and I rode Dewey. This was the first time Kim H. has ridden in a pair pace. She has had this as a goal of hers for a long time, and she absolutely loved it. I think I may have gotten another person hooked. Rain was great, just a little worked up at the beginning because her best friend Beauty had gone ahead of us with the previous team. Once she settled down and realized Dewey was her partner for the ride she did really well. The water crossing went smoothly, Kim H. kept her eyes up and her leg on the horse, and Rain walked right through. The only hiccup in that area of the course was the young foals in their turnout. Rain was a broodmare before Kim H. bought her, and she loved that job. So when she heard the babies nicker at each other she had to call to them, I'm sure remembering her own days of being a good mamma.
This was Dewey's first time riding in a pair pace as well. Initially when he saw the hectic warmup arena I'm sure he hearkened back to his racetrack training days. He was too slow to ever make it to his first race, but he did have race training. The bedlam of the warmup area with all the horses going every direction, then large groups of them cantering and hand-galloping was very exciting for him! He did well in his warmup, though, mostly trotting figure eights and smaller circles to keep his brain in his head. I explain this to people with a water hose analogy. A racehorse who is excited and needs to move is best ridden forward. Trotting is usually sufficient for Dewey, though some horses need to just canter forwards. If you try to keep them at a walk or halt it's like putting your thumb over the end of a hose. The energy has to come out somewhere. It's better to trot forwards and let the hose open up rather than have the water explode out the side of your horse.
Once he had trotted around some Dewey settled nicely, and he really enjoyed his course. He went over just about all the small jumps at the walk, and he did a few of the mid-level ones. I had to roll my eyes a few times because Dewey went over so sedately at the walk and Highboy had launched over the very same fences with melodramatic gusto.
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