because Pony Club is expensive
:lol::lol:
PC is very inexpensive for a horse club/showing. Nationals or Championships can be expensive but PC yearly activities are pretty low fees.
Can you name what the fees were in your pony club that made it inexpensive?
Does anyone think the Olympic XC course this time around was toned down a bit?
After a couple of years of cringing at the astounding size and complexity of the top XC courses at Rolex, etc… and after all the controversy of overfacing the horses, the accidents… this course looks fair and not too crazy. And there have been very few mishaps.
But I am a dressage rider and not an eventer (anymore), so I’m interested to see what others think of it.
Yearly fees to include rating preps/book/pin and some lessons 110 dollars for the year.
Rallies range from 40 to 130 dollars. The club will pay for 1/3 of the rally. The 130 rally is for a USEA REC event.
We are outside the DC metro—so our fees won’t be the lowest and probably some of the highest due to our cost of living.
D camp runs 55 dollars for 3 days of instruction by Professional Dressage, Eventing instructors. Includes crafts and food.
Pretty cheap…
[QUOTE=Ajierene;3434607]
Can you name what the fees were in your pony club that made it inexpensive?[/QUOTE]
In my PC the yearly membership was $50 approx. Rallies (horseshows) ran about 100-150 for the whole shebang including stabling… but Rallies are not a requirement. (This is pricing as of 6 years ago when I went to college and let my membership lapse)
Membership included Weekly(ish) unmounted meetings in the winter, and bi-weekly mounted meetings (lessons) with local instructors. We would fund raise for a yearly clinic with someone bigger, so it could be free or at nominal ($20 or so) cost. And the ratings were included.
Camp was expensive, about $300 for 5 days… but I only went twice. Festival and championships are very expensive, but lots of clubs fund raise. Festival was a once in a lifetime experience for me, because I got to ride with some top people.
So if you have a kid that absolutely has to go to every rally, and camp, and have all the fashionable new stuff that so an so has… PC will run you upwards of 1k/ year (hey, it’s less than most A show weekends).
If you/ your kid were like me… not poor, but I did not get to do everything. I got to pick 2 rallies (easy… dressage and eventing), and camp if I babysat to help raise $$$… it was maybe $500/year. $250ish the years I did not do camp.
But there were kids that did not show, but just did it for the horsemanship and lessons… $50/ year.
Sure some kids in my club had 50k horses, and all the cool stuff and got to do all the rallies. But I think I did pretty respectfully on my little 2k horse. Anyhow, with PC… you get out what you put in as far as effort not money.
[QUOTE=bosox;3434627]
Yearly fees to include rating preps/book/pin and some lessons 110 dollars for the year.
Rallies range from 40 to 130 dollars. The club will pay for 1/3 of the rally. The 130 rally is for a USEA REC event.
We are outside the DC metro—so our fees won’t be the lowest and probably some of the highest due to our cost of living.
D camp runs 55 dollars for 3 days of instruction by Professional Dressage, Eventing instructors. Includes crafts and food.
Pretty cheap…[/QUOTE]
How many rallies in a year? And the camp is once a year, right?
I have never been in pony club so can only go by what my trainer talked about, which included monthly clinics (about $100 a piece) a week long camp (whichi will be definitely more than $55 - a couple of hundred from what I remember correctly), on top of expected regular lessons (my trainer charges $40 a lesson, that’s about average around here). I recall something about rallies, but not sure how many - they may have been mixed in with clinics.
Then you have shows, if you want to go to them - which most kids do. Pony club price for an unrecognized show right now is $70 or so.
It just isn’t as doable.
Then you have the people that come to eventing as adults or older teens - are they out of luck with moving up because they didn’t have Pony Club? And what about the areas that don’t have Pony Club?
Pony Club is great, there are just a lot of variables there to make anything Pony Club specific a requirement for moving up levels.
EDIT: Just read your post, seeuatx - dues (which I don’t remember discussing with my trainer) may have covered lessons. Hence the ‘expected lessons’.
Rallies: Showjumping (if qualified by rating… c-1 minimum I think), Dressage, Eventing (D3 and above… D rally for D1 and D2), Tetrathalon, Quiz (called knowdown in my day… unmounted). 5 rallies total.
Most riders did not do all of them. In my club most did Dressage and Eventing and Quiz (to help us with written exams at other rallies). Only one member I know did all, but her parents owned a barn and she had 3 horses. Some members did none.
My club did not host regular horse shows. I went to the fairground and showed in dinky little 4-h stuff between the bigger stuff for fun… hey it was $5 a class.
Sorry to be politically incorrect as usual, but your eventer horses all look underfed and the dressage tests look like crap. Your horses are incredibly brave and fit but I feel sorry for them. Pushing them to the brink at any risk and trying to wear too many hats means none of them are worn quite properly. Just my opinion of course
[QUOTE=seeuatx;3434672]
Rallies: Showjumping (if qualified by rating… c-1 minimum I think), Dressage, Eventing (D3 and above… D rally for D1 and D2), Tetrathalon, Quiz (called knowdown in my day… unmounted). 5 rallies total.
Most riders did not do all of them. In my club most did Dressage and Eventing and Quiz (to help us with written exams at other rallies). Only one member I know did all, but her parents owned a barn and she had 3 horses. Some members did none.
My club did not host regular horse shows. I went to the fairground and showed in dinky little 4-h stuff between the bigger stuff for fun… hey it was $5 a class.[/QUOTE]
I do that all the time at shows - was going to a few weeks ago if I didn’t screw up my back so badly.
Anyway - what might be a good thing is to take the requirements for C level Pony Club and adjust them to meet the needs of the event world. Make a rally, of sorts, mandatory to go from say Training to Prelim and passing the tests a requirement for being able to do Prelim. maybe another one to go from intermediate to advanced.
I have no idea what it takes to be a C Pony Club person…so just tossing stuff out there.
C standards of proficiency
[QUOTE=Ajierene;3434680]
I have no idea what it takes to be a C Pony Club person…so just tossing stuff out there.[/QUOTE]
http://www.ponyclub.org/files/bin/2313
All standards could be found under “forms” at ponyclub.org, for reference if you are interested in what is involved.
[QUOTE=springer;3434678]
Sorry to be politically incorrect as usual, but your eventer horses all look underfed and the dressage tests look like crap. Your horses are incredibly brave and fit but I feel sorry for them. Pushing them to the brink at any risk and trying to wear too many hats means none of them are worn quite properly. Just my opinion of course[/QUOTE]
Yikes. What prompted that? Go through it out on the eventing forum if you are looking for a train wreck. For the record, your opinion sounds a bit ignorant but I guess you are entitled to it. Oh and don’t feel sorry for my horse. He puts up with a couple minutes of dressage torture so he can gallop xc GLEEFULLY. Ever seen a horse smile?
Anyways…I was just using PC as an example. I have no idea what it costs but I know it was a hell of a lot cheaper than just about anything else I have done. Mum and dad didn’t object to the cost…just the politics;). If you can’t afford to show and do PC then I say do PC. Point being that PC has well established levels and guidelines and could provide a basis for some sort of qualification blueprint.
[QUOTE=sisu27;3434727]
Anyways…I was just using PC as an example. I have no idea what it costs but I know it was a hell of a lot cheaper than just about anything else I have done. Mum and dad didn’t object to the cost…just the politics;). If you can’t afford to show and do PC then I say do PC. Point being that PC has well established levels and guidelines and could provide a basis for some sort of qualification blueprint.[/QUOTE]
I can agree with it being used as a blueprint.
Thanks for the link Seeuatx, though right now I can’t get anywhere with it - doesn’t seem to be working right with my computer. I think that is the signal for me to go to bed (stadium jumping is online tomorrow at 715 after all…).
[QUOTE=whitewolfe001;3434617]
Does anyone think the Olympic XC course this time around was toned down a bit? [/QUOTE]
The XC at the Olympics is never full-on - you never know exactly who is going to show up (at least for the individuals), and you don’t want to kill someone… You need to take into account that some folks might not feel comfortable saying “the course is too difficult for my horse” when they’re riding here.
I think MES did a spot-on job of designing a course that would sort the riders and horses according to ability without seriously endangering anyone. When you take into account the size of the venue (not terribly large) and the temperature+humidity that the later competitors would have to endure, it wasn’t an easy task. It’ll be interesting to see how many don’t present for the final phase…
[QUOTE=springer;3434678]
Sorry to be politically incorrect as usual, but your eventer horses all look underfed and the dressage tests look like crap. Your horses are incredibly brave and fit but I feel sorry for them. Pushing them to the brink at any risk and trying to wear too many hats means none of them are worn quite properly. Just my opinion of course[/QUOTE]
And you are a twit
Just my opinion of course:lol:
Also
Pony Club = more important and worth more for the $$ than showing!
Knowledge, experience, great clinicians and lifetime friends!
As an adult re-rider, one of my proudest moments was when one of my early instructors – a very well-respected dressage judge – asked me if I’d been in Pony Club as a kid. She liked my horsemanship skills, though I was and am far from a “pretty” or super talented rider.
I had to tell her no, though. I never had my own horse, parents could not afford it and were not willing to drive me to “horsey stuff” more than twice a week. We lived in a big city – without a ride there was no way to get to horses. Luckily my instruction was from someone who knew a thing or two about horses and had the students do a lot of the horse care, simply because she could not afford to hire grooms. Not everything about her was wonderful, but in that way she was very good.
Now as an adult, with eventing aspirations and a lovely little horse, I do wish there was something like PC for grown-ups. I get great knowledge from friends who have done PC but would really love to learn it all first-hand!
I think I am drawn towards eventing (very low level) simply because it’s three very different things that one has to be passably good at. It appeals to my intellect as much as anything else.
Some great points quietann. I was in a similar situation in that I did not have Pony Club in my area, nor did I have parents that would have put the money and time into it.
In Pony Club, don’t you generally own your own horse? That would have been a challenge as well, since my first horse was bought and kept with my own money.
I worked for a rich, older lady one summer and she talked about the origins of Pony Club and how the idea came about because there were so many kids around that did not know or possibly care about proper horsemanship. Pony Club was designed to make sure they understood their responsibilities as a horse owner.
Today there are a lot of adults that are finally living their childhood dreams of horses. My step-mom has owned a horse for the last 15 years, but she did not start riding until her late 30’s. She has always boarded her horse and the barn owner takes care of shots, worming and other things. She would be hard pressed to pass any Pony Club tests. She isn’t a bad person or a bad horseperson, just not knowledgeable. She has taken classes about horses where she could, but there are not many out there and not everyone can afford to the time or money to take the college courses she took.
Someone like this could really benefit from an adult type Pony Club (Horse Club maybe?)
And while we’re opinionating, what about those clinically obese show hunters? And saddlebreds going hollow? and the weird feet on show drafts? and in human sports, those horrible triathletes who aren’t quite great at any one event and look way too skinny compared to, say, me?
(I know, I shouldn’t contribute… but really…)
Actually, these Games and this course have gone a long way to restore my faith in Eventing. Which, post Rolex, was at a seriously low ebb.
Now, I’m a dressage rider, but to my not-an-eventer eye, it looked like the course was a pretty darn good test of horse and rider. It looked to ride pretty tough technically with some tough bending lines, options and those skinnies that gave a lot of riders problems but no really scary or dangerous jumps. It seemed like the shortened time was a good idea (although no one finished within the time, right?) given the conditions as it looked like all the horses finished tired, but there were none of the heat/exhaustion issues we’ve seen in previous Olympics.
I will say that after watching the German riders it was very easy to see why they are leading.
