Practice makes perfect: Showing in Cadham and Edenbridge
Two shows in the one weekend is hard work, especially cleaning and preparing so many ponies beforehand. Some think us totally mad but we were committed to a Sunday show and decided at a later date that the Cadham Shetland show on the Saturday was the perfect small venue for our novice two year colt, Snelsmore Pavarotti. It just so happened they were the same weekend. We ploughed on through regardless.
Considering it was the bank holiday our journey to the New forest on the Saturday was a lot easier than expected. The day started off well with Snelsmore Oceana wining her class. Snelsmore Pavorritti was next to the ring. We were pleasantly surprised with how much he had remembered from his first two outings, he concentrated more and kept himself nicely balanced, despite a slight downhill first run. He stood much better for our judge, David Sykes, to have a good look at him. Our patience paid off as he won the two and three year-old colt class and went on to be Reserve Junior Champion. Mission accomplished, a great practice and result!
Unfortunately our two older ponies in the afternoon didn’t do quite as well despite both performing great; that’s showing for you I guess!
Looking on the bright side we were home by mid-afternoon and able to prepare another five ponies for the Edenbridge and Oxted show the next day. I had already bathed them all a few days before so it was a fingers-crossed moment to see if they had kept themselves reasonably clean.
The next morning, we were relieved to have a much later start than the 4:00 am before. We left our yard at 11:00 am for a 2:45 pm start in the afternoon class. We were right to be slightly worried about the notorious M25, traffic was very heavy but with no queue getting into the show it gave us time to let the ponies have a rest while we had our usual coffee and croissants before we took to the ring.
First up we had our two yearling fillies Snelsmore Q-Me and Snelsmore Querl; Q-Me in the Novice and Querl to follow in the yearling class. Both ponies have progressed well though the season and went on to win their classes. Two down, three to go.
The next class was the two and three year-old filly, in which we had the lightly shown bay filly Snelsmore Oasis entered. As the class went through the motions, we were delighted to receive a third win of the afternoon.
The classes kept coming however our winning streak didn’t quite hold out long enough for Kindy Heidi as she came second in a very strong mare class, a brilliant finish considering the quality of the ponies she was up against.
Finally came the Championship and with just the two of us to lead Cliff and I decided Oasis and Querl were perhaps our best options for the title. Our luck must have returned and we couldn’t have hope for a better ending to our day. Snelsmore Oasis took Junior Champion and her full sister Querl Reserve Junior Champion. Thinking that was the end of a successful day, we were elated when Oasis took it a step further and went on to win Reserve Senior Champion as well.
It may have been a busy weekend but we certainly cant complain that it was a waste. A worth while practice for some on Saturday while others took previous experience and pushed themselves to the top on Sunday. Although both exhausted, it’s times like this that we can really say ‘practice makes perfect’.
Practice makes perfect: Showing in Cadham and Edenbridge
Two shows in the one weekend is hard work, especially cleaning and preparing so many ponies beforehand. Some think us totally mad but we were committed to a Sunday show and decided at a later date that the Cadham Shetland show on the Saturday was the perfect small venue for our novice two year colt, Snelsmore Pavarotti. It just so happened they were the same weekend. We ploughed on through regardless.
Considering it was the bank holiday our journey to the New forest on the Saturday was a lot easier than expected. The day started off well with Snelsmore Oceana wining her class. Snelsmore Pavorritti was next to the ring. We were pleasantly surprised with how much he had remembered from his first two outings, he concentrated more and kept himself nicely balanced, despite a slight downhill first run. He stood much better for our judge, David Sykes, to have a good look at him. Our patience paid off as he won the two and three year-old colt class and went on to be Reserve Junior Champion. Mission accomplished, a great practice and result!
Unfortunately our two older ponies in the afternoon didn’t do quite as well despite both performing great; that’s showing for you I guess!
Looking on the bright side we were home by mid-afternoon and able to prepare another five ponies for the Edenbridge and Oxted show the next day. I had already bathed them all a few days before so it was a fingers-crossed moment to see if they had kept themselves reasonably clean.
The next morning, we were relieved to have a much later start than the 4:00 am before. We left our yard at 11:00 am for a 2:45 pm start in the afternoon class. We were right to be slightly worried about the notorious M25, traffic was very heavy but with no queue getting into the show it gave us time to let the ponies have a rest while we had our usual coffee and croissants before we took to the ring.
First up we had our two yearling fillies Snelsmore Q-Me and Snelsmore Querl; Q-Me in the Novice and Querl to follow in the yearling class. Both ponies have progressed well though the season and went on to win their classes. Two down, three to go.
The next class was the two and three year-old filly, in which we had the lightly shown bay filly Snelsmore Oasis entered. As the class went through the motions, we were delighted to receive a third win of the afternoon.
The classes kept coming however our winning streak didn’t quite hold out long enough for Kindy Heidi as she came second in a very strong mare class, a brilliant finish considering the quality of the ponies she was up against.
Finally came the Championship and with just the two of us to lead Cliff and I decided Oasis and Querl were perhaps our best options for the title. Our luck must have returned and we couldn’t have hope for a better ending to our day. Snelsmore Oasis took Junior Champion and her full sister Querl Reserve Junior Champion. Thinking that was the end of a successful day, we were elated when Oasis took it a step further and went on to win Reserve Senior Champion as well.
It may have been a busy weekend but we certainly cant complain that it was a waste. A worth while practice for some on Saturday while others took previous experience and pushed themselves to the top on Sunday. Although both exhausted, it’s times like this that we can really say ‘practice makes perfect’.