Dressage Young Horse Championships

When we decided to compete my mare, Petite Belle, aka "Belle", in the 4 year old Dressage Young Horse Championships we had a plan and goal in mind.

I wrote an article, 4 Steps To the Dressage Young Horse Championship Classes, that explains the best way to do this.

I had decided that I was going to keep this talented young mare as my next prospect and then bred her at a later time (she was already approved as a Premium Mare).

photo of Petite Belle and Melissa at 2011 YHC by LindaW

We decided to take her to one of the early qualifying classes and if the score was high enough we would enter her is a second and see if we could qualify for the National Championships.

The goal was to achieve recognition for Belle and Patrick, her sire, our stallion, as a quality dressage horse and quality dressage horse producer, respectively, and give my daughter, Melissa more experience in the Dressage Championship rings. She had already done well with her horse in 2009 at Regional Championships, but this would be her 1st time competing Nationally.

At the National Championships, the 4 year old horses have a warm-up class that does not count toward the final score, but is scored and placed. It is supposed to give the horse some additional time to settle down and be ready for the final competition.

Belle and Melissa were the 1st horse and rider in the ring and they ended up placing 4th out of 15 after coming into the competition ranked 12th. We were very pleased and excited.

The following day was off for the 4 year olds, and Melissa just worked Belle lightly to keep her from getting stiff and they both looked comfortable and ready for the next day.

photo of Petite Belle and Melissa
Ride for the Ribbons
by LindaW

On the day of the final competition, their order of go was in the second half of the class and Melissa watched the other horses and riders nervously. The scores were a lot different from the warm-up and she began to panic. By the time she was on the horse, she was a basket case.

Needless to say the ride was one of the worst I had seen them perform - both were high as kites. They ended up placing 15th.

Melissa was devastated and upset with herself - I was disappointed because I knew they could have done better, but I was still proud that my horse was ranked 15th in the nation - and my daughter had gotten them there.

I could have hired an experienced rider and probably placed much higher, but I would have deprived my daughter of a very valuable experience. As I stated above, one of the goals of this competition was to give Melissa experience at this level. She will do better the next time - and the next - and the next.

I saw this happen to other horse and riders throughout the weekend. Several riders were also the owners of the horse and had very little experience at this level of competition. Even some of the professional riders had problems.

It is a young horse competition and they are not yet consistent in their performance and can still be unpredictable. They are very reactive to the emotions of their rider and don't understand when she is not the calm, confident person that is usually on their back.

I still think this is a good program for recognizing young talent. It is also a great way for breeders like myself to see how our young horses compare with others as well as a place to see what bloodlines are producing the top Dressage young horses.

Source: http://www.squidoo.com/dressage-young-horse-championships

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