Judge’s comment for an…exuberant… canter depart simply said: “being a mare”
I think that was the same test where the scribe described my pinto as “black with odd spots of white on body” in the distinguishing marks section!
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That is funny! Very odd as well.
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I have something to add to this thread after my first ever rated dressage show a couple weekends ago. It wasn’t a written comment, but a verbal one which has me dying a little on the inside.
The morning of my first two tests they had already called for coats off due to the heat. I had gone to the show alone and am still in the process of getting a ‘you’re alone at a show’ routine down. Get horse ready, get myself ready - I have a long sleeve white top, one of the newer ones with the patterned inside of the collar so when you turn it down it’s all cutesy and stuff. I had the collar turned down as I was finishing getting prepped. My jacket was still in the truck, so I walked horse out of the barn to the truck, grabbed the jacket, threw it on, mounted and started warming up.
I go through BOTH of my tests. Talking to people in the warm up ring in between tests. Even run back into the barn for fly spray really quick.
I get done with my second test and head back to the stall. I shed the jacket and start untacking and the show steward walks up. Convo goes like this:
Show Steward: Umm…excuse me?
Me: Yes, ma’am?
SS: I need to talk to you about your attire.
Me: Umm…okay? I’m sorry I was in beige breeches, my white ones are too big. And I’m sorry I rode in a hunt saddle. I know it isn’t ideal, but it’s all I have. I thought it was allowed in an Intro Test.
SS: No No…The judge would like to know why you were were wearing a T-Shirt in the show ring.
Me: looking down at my long sleeve shirt that I still have on, tucked into my breeches A T-Shirt?
SS: Hmm…Well, yes, I see you are not in a T-shirt.
Me: totally confused and now filling with anxiety, I reach up to my neck Oh. My. I forgot to turn my collar up!!!
SS: Ah, yes. You need to fix that.
Me: Did that disqualify me?
SS: I don’t think so
Me: Whew. I will fix it. I’m so so sorry. 
I put my jacket on over my turned down collar. In the video, it looks like I’m wearing NOTHING.
And scene.
Sunday went better 
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Gotta do what you gotta do in the heat… 
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It was just funny that I interacted with more than a few people and no one stopped to say, ‘Yo, new girl, do you even have a shirt on under that jacket??’
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They may have thought you had a stock tie in your pocket that you were just going to throw on at the last minute.
Or they may have been so wrapped up in their own stuff that you could have been wearing a dinosaur costume and they wouldn’t have noticed. (This is reassuring if you are ever nervous about other people watching you ride at a show. I reckon I’d have to do something pretty heinous for anyone except the judge to notice…)
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A few from my late gelding - “Thank you! The best forward connection of the day!” “Elegant Pair” and “Whoa!” with that one being on a first level test we got a 75 on with a 9 on several movements including his stretchy circle, which was always our favorite movement. He was always lovely and I love going back through our dressage tests.
I don’t have the dressage tests from my horse before him - a much less naturally dressage inclined appaloosa. I vaguely remember one test with “no lengthening shown” in our trot lengthenings and then another comment on lack of trot lengthenings in the further remarks. Yep, got it, the stride didn’t lengthen!
A friend got a comment that looked like “Sucked bad” on initial glance. Further inspection showed it to actually be “sucked back”, which was a much more constructive comment!
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I’d blame the scribe for that one; not the judge!
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Took my leased guy (who’s a cute overo Arab cross) to a schooling show where he lost his damn mind at the judge’s booth. We’re talking my trainer had to hand-walk us past the booth like we were getting ponied at the racetrack. We got “attractive pair” and I’m fairly certain it was just complimenting our turnout and his paint splashes 
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This is so something I could see myself doing!
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My company horse was a very very very quiet thoroughbred. At the dressage day he was on a 20 m circle in canter and I turned to my friend and said how does he look? She said he looks the best I have ever seen him go. I replied with, I know, but in actual fact I am completely and totally out of control.
I have asked him to do a 20 metre circle in canter, he is doing a 20 m Circle in canter, but he is only doing a 20 m Circle in canter because he wants to do a 20m circle in canter, not because I have really asked him to.
That is where you find out that entertainment is not given any points in a test!
In the second test I had worked him down and he went well and we came second.
The judge who stopped me said that you were supposed to judge each horse as if you have never seen it before and she could not believe that I was riding the same horse. She wanted to put on the test much better than first test, but of course couldn’t do that, because of not having seen us before.
I flipped over to the second test and the second judge had written in capital letters underlined three times and asterixed twice** MUCH BETTER THAN FIRST TEST **
It turned out that someone had given a bag of oats to our work Every.single.coworker had thought, I am not giving oats to my horse, I will give them to Aztec, he is so quiet it won’t matter. Az ended up getting a bag of oats in a week and a half. It took 2 weeks to get my sane horse back.
I was actually pretty lucky he didn’t kill me in those 2 weeks or that first test.
DO NOT FEED OTHER PEOPLE’S ANIMALS.
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I did a combined test this summer where the dressage was in the facility’s (quite nice and only a little spooky) indoor… Which is also inhabited by a range of birds, including some very fat and sassy pigeons.
End of fairly good test test, transitioning to trot at F before turning down center line, I heard a rustle of wings, and my usually fairly quiet beast scooted forward. Darn. Ah well.
On the way out, I apologized to the judge for the spook, at which point she told me that it wasn’t a bird flying behind us that I’d heard, but an enormous fat pigeon cannoning into my poor horse’s butt!
This movement was actually our highest mark on the test (7), with the single word comment “obedient.”
Doesn’t look like much, but in context, it meant a lot to me (we’ve had previous bird-related trauma where a hawk tried to beat its way into the indoor by bashing on the plexi, causing a justified spook that would have been fine if I hadn’t been leaning over to put a jacket on a jump standard, resulting in the only time that my horse has been fallen off of).
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I am tall and my horse is not. On a test from our first show at Training Level:
“Your lower leg never touches horse but he tries anyway! Keep him!”
I did
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Finally, have a comment to contribute:
On a test sheet from GAIGs this year, there’s the remark “He’s Your Friend”. My trainer, my spouse, the entire barn are rather puzzled by this - ignoring the fact I was riding a mare - is this meant to say I don’t trust my horse? Or that she saved my butt?
Aww, see I read this as you guys having a clear bond and mutual trust!
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regionals this year showing GP. Best comment I have ever received - “Horse performs with a smile on his face!!” Made me so happy that despite all my fumbling and mistakes, my boy still enjoys showing at 20 yrs old! And yes, that judge placed us first so it was not a pity comment 
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Let’s go with that - it was a pretty pleasant if not inspiring test, (the other judge said I was tense but there was a pretty significant score difference between C and E so who knows)
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My old eventing pony was, to say the least, unimpressive looking, People would see us and say “You’re not going to event HIM, are you?”
My favorite comment was from Stewart Treveranus: “very supple, tactfully ridden”
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Riding down centerline toward X to begin the training level test (in lumpy footing). My horse stumbled just as we began to halt and went down on one knee, then quickly returned to normal. I proceeded with the test. oops…forgot my salute, -2. The judge was Lois Heyerdahl. Her comment was “Horse is not to salute, rider is responsible for that part”.
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I love this!
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