Odessa was great in her first schooling show.
This is a link to the rest of the first hazard. Janeene's camera died, so she whipped out the Flip.
I took her up to the Gayla Driving Center a day early so I could get the kinks worked out on Friday if there were going to be any. I am driving her in an egg-butt straight bar snaffle w/latex wrapped around it because she has such a sensitive mouth and more aggressive bits seem to bother her. She's never been heavy. Well she was pretty wound up on Friday, so we trotted around the whole perimeter of the Gayla and I was worried the bit wasn't going to be enough. She held it together though and never did anything stupid. Then we walked some and did some hazard practice around round bales in the field and through the water obstacle. She was good but still energetic. It was good to have Rachel there to talk me through staying calm.
On Saturday she was much, much calmer and probably exhausted from the day before. She was still up but not pulling on me and we made it through dressage with a 69 which I thrilled with because we looked drunk when we tried to go down the center line the week before. I believe TJ's comment on our first center line attempt was, "This is going to be interesting."
She went through all of the hazards with only one miscommunication (can see in the video) and one brain lapse on my part (Janeene graciously omitted). She thought the timer with her hand up was very scary, but she trotted on. She's very quick and easy to guide, so I can't wait until she gets the hang of this and can really move through the gates.
We have a week in Blowing Rock, NC, another schooling show, the Indiana CDE and then Lexington in October. It's a lot to ask of her, but I think she can do it.
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