Watching Kentucky, Having Opinions


 
Spent Saturday watching the livestream of Land Rover Kentucky Three-Day Event presented by Mars Equestrian. It ain’t what it used to be.

I understand how the changes happened. I watched from the sidelines as eventing got rid of penalty zones, created the ‘Unjumpable Fence’ between options, got rid of unjumpable fences, created split flagged jumps, and so on. I’m all for horses and riders coming home safely. But the sport has morphed out of recognition.

Show Jumping Over Furniture
First, let me say that the course was beautiful: rolling terrain, perfect green grass, gorgeous obstacles. The jumps were better looking than the furniture in my house. Better made as well. The course was pretty. Too pretty.

What I watched on my phone had no trace of galloping through the woods, leaping with abandon over whatever obstacles had fallen in your way. I’ve seen wilder courses in hunter classes with outside courses, for those of us old enough to remember these.

I was astounded at the number of skinnies and corners and skinny corners. Striding? Combinations? Holding your line? There is a name for that. It’s called show jumping.

XC Becomes A Touch Class
Galloping at speed was hurting too many horses and humans. So eventing introduced obstacles that involved slowing down and turning, as above. As the jumps got narrower, it became more and more common for riders to knock over the flag marking the side of the jump.

So, did the horse negotiate the question and touch the flag on the way by? Or did the horse push the flag with his body while bailing to the side? Apparently there is now a rule that awards 15 penalties if the horse is deemed to have avoided the jumping effort. Unfortunately, no one can tell in the heat of the moment. Not rider. Not fence judge. It has to be determined later by video.

Other classes that I am old enough to remember are touch classes in jumper shows. In addition to knockdowns you racked up penalties if your horse touched the pole with front or hind hoof. I remember spotters deploying around the ring to see what you hit.

These classes are engraved on my memory since I had the great good fortune to show a mare who was a marvelous jumper. She never stopped, never took down a pole. OTOH, she was not against brushing her toes over the jumps on her way by. Yes, I remember touch classes.

Is this what eventing has become? A class whose faults need to be subjectively evaluated by judges? Plus, the points are awarded after the fact. How can the rider plan? Did I knock the flag? Should I ease off the gas and save my horse for another day? Am I still in the running?

I am not close enough to eventing to know how often this happens, or if it affects the upper levels more than the lower, or vice versa. From a spectator’s point of view, it seems to be a hairball. Maybe XC needs to become a knockdown class. Flag down equals X points. Bumped it with your toe? Too bad; so sad.

Enough carping. It’s easy to point out problems.

Red Saddlepad
I like to honor the last place finisher. DFL beats DNF beats DNS.

BOLYTAIR B was ridden by Dominic Schramm to 31st place. They placed 27th after dressage. Faults & time on XC. Double clear in show jumping.

Yeah, they trailed the field, but let’s see you do what they did [Kentucky Memories]. Modeled on Tour de France Lanterne Rouge, “Celebrating the last-place rider in the General Classification … because you couldn’t hang on his wheel for 30 seconds.”

The folks down at the end of the field are usually thrilled to finish. They may be a first timer, or had problems along the way. Simply getting through the finish flags on stadium is enough to make their weekend, if not their year. The cynicism doesn’t creep in until you go high enough up the results that people start to smell the trophies. And the checks. KY Results.

So, what do you think about the changes to eventing? Also, can anyone tell me how Bolytair B got 31 jump faults on XC? That’s separate from 23.6 time faults. The only scores I know of end in 5s and 0s.

Thank you for reading,
Katherine Walcott

The Write Start, Teardrop Lettering

On My Mind, Miscellaneous Visuals

 

 
~~~
The Write Start is a 21-day writing prompt program being run by See Jane Write. Hot Pink is the brand color for SJW.

Process notes: Geometric. Manipulating shapes to fit grids rather than relying on drawing skill. More clever than artistic.


[The Write Start, Circle Lettering]
 

[The Write Start, Block Lettering]

Thank you for reading,
Katherine Walcott

750 Words, A Place To Write

On My Mind, Miscellaneous Thoughts

 

Timeline of day 1, 750 Words, April 22, 2019

750 Words is a tracking site for daily writing. I heard about it from The Write Start, a 21-day writing prompt program being run by See Jane Write. The goal is to write 750 words each day as writing practice or therapy or creative release, or some combination thereof.

I already write daily, or close to, for the blog. I already do a credible amount of self-reflection, also for the blog. So, as with The Write Start, I will use 750 Words as a fiction exercise. Signed up on Monday. As of this writing (Friday), I have done 3 of the 5 days. I skipped Tuesday due to lessons and riding, so not too bummed about that. I plan to join once my 30-day free membership has elapsed.

The parts that appeal to me are game-ifying the practice and typing. In addition to points for completing each day’s writing, the site displays speed, distractions, mind-set while writing, time orientation, and various other ways your word usage can be sorted and categorized.

Either this appeals to you, or it doesn’t.

Drafting in long-hand never made sense to me. I’d just have to retype. Now, I’ve gotten used to composing on the computer. Writing the daily prompt for TWS in a journal has been, if not hell, at least heck. I thought about switching to the computer, but decided that I could survive journaling for 21 days. Then 750 was mentioned at the beginning of the third week. I couldn’t log on fast enough.

My handwriting is horrid. Despite owning more pens than I wish to admit, I don’t write by hand all that much anymore. I still take interview notes by hand, but heaven help me if the recorder fails and I have to rely on those hashmarks.

My handwriting is slow. I’m so much faster with a keyboard, even with going back to correct typos. Yes, it’s a draft that one one else will see. No, I can’t let them be. Yes, I’m uptight. Moving on. Part of the goal of daily writing is to move quickly through your thoughts. To get into a flow.

As I said, it’s a personal choice, either it amuses you or you clutch your journal to your chest and regard me with an appalled expression.

Privacy? The site claims not to do data mining for any purpose, nefarious or otherwise. It is presented as a writing community run by two well-intentioned individuals. Is this true? Probably. Could it be a well-crafted front? Possibly. I work under the assumptions that A) nothing is truly private on the Internet. Hacks happen. Alternatively, I become sufficiently interesting to the government/general public and everything I’ve ever written winds up in court/on the front page. B) Big Brother is here. Has been for a while. Such is life. Might as well put him to good use as data storage. I probably should be horrified. There are so many more immediate concerns about which to be horrified. But I digress.

Off to write today’s words.

TWS week 2 [Writing Utter Nonsense]
TWS week 1 [Schadenfreude Saturday, My Pain Is Your Amusement]

Thank you for reading,
Katherine Walcott

Even The King

Visual Storytelling

 


 
You may be a beloved corporate icon. You still have to poop.
Mt. Laurel, AL, USA
April 17, 2019
#followthehitch

Visit to Birmingham 2016
[Clydesdale Humor]
[Hitching The Clydesdales]
[Foto Friday: Horses in the City]

Miscellaneous Budweiser Clydesdales
[Postcrossing 2016]
[Bucket List – Accomplished 2012]
[Superbowl Sunday 2012]

I never know how much to give away. Will anyone get the references in the title? Should I say something? Let folks figure it out on their own? As a compromise, hidden answers: Wiki, Wiki.

Thank you for reading,
Katherine Walcott

Driving Ups & Downs

View From The Back Seat

 

 
After successful lessons with the new cart [1,2], we hitched by ourselves. Yay.

Next lesson, Milton started hopping as soon as he was asked to move off. Been a while. Caught us by surprise. Boo.

The fit lasted only a few moments, the distance from quarterline to quarterline. Out of habit, I headed him with a leadrope. I was able to wrestle him to a stop, just before we crashed into the only obstacle in the ring. After half a lap of accompanied walking, he decided to fly right and was fine for the rest of the lesson. Yay.

Canceled plans to go off and school on our own. Boo.

Next lesson, a little side-eye at the start, then a fantastic lesson. Yay.

This is the second time Milton has pitched a fit a few days after a jumping lesson [Extremes]. He loves the ring at Falcon Hill Farm. He goes well in it. However, he may work harder than everyone – including Milton – realizes. This may leave him with lingering, post-gym muscle aches. He’s not the type to loosen up on his own. I’ll just stand here and rust, thank you very much.

We are learning that Milton folds at the first sign of adversity. If he thinks he is capable of what you are asking, he is a happy, willing horse. If he is overwhelmed – even the slightest bit – in mind or body, he is utterly convinced that he can’t do the thing. We posit his defeatist attitude is a remnant of his lack of success on the track.

Amidst all of this, we went up to volunteer for a MTCC schooling day. My driver was stoked. I could see he wanted to be out in the field running around the obstacles. I was less enthused. Much like Chatt Hills [Jumps], all I could see was gap between where we were and where we wanted to be. What can I say, I’m a dewy-eyed optimist.

Even when Milton is going well to cart, it’s hard – for me – to rest easy. He was going well before our driving debut last year. We’re still twitchy from that. We have learned that driving a horse is really easy, right up until it’s not. Things can go wahoonie-shaped in a hurry.

Three milestones to achieve before any al fresco driving competitions:

1) Driving competition(s) in a ring. No idea how to do this.

2) Riding competition(s) in the open. Gulp.

3) Practice staying overnight away from home. Not sure how much this contributed to his moods in Tennessee & the non-competes [not back, GA1, GA2]

All of these have subtasks, such as seeing other horses hitched to carts, riding in a class with more than one other person, schooling in the open, driving in the ring with other carts, hitching outside the ring, surviving warm-up with a cart and so on, added to the skills mention previously [The Next Rungs On Milton’s Ladder Of Success].

Well, if Milton is not our CDE horse, if he never leaves the ring at SSF, he has taught us huge amounts about driving. Good on him.

Thank you for reading,
Katherine Walcott

The Saddle Seat Saddle Gathers Dust

Non-Adventures in Saddle Seat

 

 
I rode saddle seat one day last month. There looks to be no saddle seat at all for me in April. This is a scheduling issue rather than a philosophical statement.

We were deep in dressage land … or the barn was away at a show … or Milton went over to Stepping Stone Farm for riding/driving. My ASB lessons filter to the bottom of the list.

OTOH, I forgot how much I like working with own horse. Rodney doesn’t count as he has managed to avoid a regular program. It’s nice to focus my riding on a long-term project rather than adapting on the fly each time I get on a horse. It’s fun to make plans for the next steps in a horse’s training.

Saddle Seat Wednesday will be back. Need to figure out how to work it all in. A pleasant problem to have.

Milton experiences the world outside of the ring at SSF.

 
Thank you for reading,
Katherine Walcott