Congratulations Foxcreek! I noticed Charlie appears to have won his colors so I assume he is a fox hunter? Or is it just a fancy new jacket, it is hard to tell anymore. I love to see kids that are comfortable riding outside a ring, hunting etc.
pony jumpers
This is what we see in our zone. Every few years there are enough ponies to fill classes. It’s kind of a hit or miss thing. It’s hard to commit to lease or purchase a pony jumper not knowing if you’ll have classes to show it in.
Many times by the time the kids are good enough to pilot a pony around a course that high (it’s a big course on a pony!) the kids are too tall for a pony. Girls hit their growth spurts between 12 and 14 and many are just too tall to comfortably fit on a large pony.
Face it, it is way easier to learn how to do the jumpers on a horse. You need a lot less pace and the margin of error is greater on a horse. You’ve in theory got a lot more step and scope to bail you out if you need it.
As a parent, if your daughter is in the middle of a growth spurt, its a little scary to think about a pony not knowing if she’ll still fit on the pony at Pony Finals the next year.
BAC, Charlie’s jacket is just a Jumper coat, nothing to do with fox hunting. Lots of the kids have colored collars on their jumper coats, I don’t know, I guess it’s the style right now.
However, Charlie and his pony do ride all over the place outside of the ring! 
they trail ride everywhere, gallop up the hills in the prairie fields, and they’ve even gone riding in the ocean together!!!
Thanks Foxcreek, I am not up on current fashion trends. It sounds like Charlie and his pony are having great fun together, what a wonderful way to learn to ride.
Top ten pony medal
54 GLEN ALLEN TAYLOR ST JACQUES TRUE 1
169 HIGHLAND PARK ALEXANDRA PIELET TRUE 2
51 CENTER MORCHIES ERICKA KOSCINSKI TRUE 3
144 OUIEDO CAMRYN HALLEY TRUE 4
108 GROSSE POINTE FARMS ANNALISE REED TRUE 5
30 ROCKFORD VANESSA MAZZOLI TRUE 6
61 NEW MILFORD SOPHIA CALAMARI TRUE 7
109 BERWYN CHLOE WHITE TRUE 8
6 OCALA DEVIN SEEK TRUE 9
43 ROSSMOOR BIANCA JENKINS TRUE 10
Thank you for all your work in posting the results of every class for us sarcam.
^ Ditto!!
[QUOTE=MHM;7706389]
The Pony Club rider who won the individual competition tonight is 10 years old. 10 years old! With a show age of 9! Congrats to her and everybody involved.[/QUOTE]
The pony she was riding is a regular mount in my hunt club when she isn’t being prepped for a show. Youth and adult, she has carried them safely from start to finish and is always still happy at the end of a hunt.
^ That is great! One of the pieces I read after the class quoted the young rider as saying something like, “The pony is the one who deserves most of the credit. She’s the one who jumped all the jumps!” 
I believe early on Blue kept jumping over paddock gates at the farm. 
The owners are the nicest, most decent horsemen that you could ever meet. They always have an encouraging word and are filled with gratitude by the horses and friends they are around.
[QUOTE=SLW;7707555]
The pony she was riding is a regular mount in my hunt club when she isn’t being prepped for a show. Youth and adult, she has carried them safely from start to finish and is always still happy at the end of a hunt.[/QUOTE]
That’s awesome!
Is there any way to find out more results than top ten for the medal? My daughter had a great firsf round and dropped off the standby list after the larges, amd was just wondering where she ended up.
The Equitation is not usually judged like the rest of PF. At least in the past it has been judged more like the USEF Medal finals where scores are not necessarily given. It is often done just keeping a top rider list and you just get deleted when better rounds occur.
Does anyone know where I can watch a playback of the pony jumpers? USEF network only has the top three rounds.
^ They are probably available at www.Shownet.biz, though you may have to pay to see them. Or you could check the free Shownet channel on YouTube, where they often post lots of rounds. I don’t know if they would be up this soon.
Do you know how they choose which videos to post on the free channel? I would love to find some professional ones of DD at last year’s pony finals. There didn’t seem to be any rhyme or reason to the rounds that were up.
^ I think it has to do with which trips have been purchased. I believe someone said on here a while back that if you buy a video, you can also elect to have it posted on their YouTube channel.
I haven’t done it myself, so I don’t know all the details.
I wish I could have seen more of these pony jumper rounds. Based on the ones I can see on usef on line, and the few on YouTube, these rounds are GREAT - compared to what I saw on line at Devon.
Seriously - there might have been 2-3 rounds at Devon which were not SCARY and dangerous (for example: jumping so flat as to obliterate the jump with the front half of the pony).
Yes, the kids can learn to ride better - sure. Yes, this course looks too hard for them.
But it’s clear that at least one trainer (see above post describing the course walk) is setting a clear standard for good riding. Too bad many other apparently are not.
Letting these young riders in the ring to run pell-mell over the course in the hope of getting over the jumps is just absurd at best and dangerous at worst.
To those kids who had their act together and put forth good rounds: CONGRATULATIONS! I can’t imagine being able to do such a good job at such a young age!
Guess I’ll have to be happy with our videos. You couldn’t buy the videos without paying to join Shownet.
As I said earlier, I think there were a number of kids who just weren’t prepared this year. I know that last year the kids who had a lot of trouble were the ones who hadn’t been actively competing or not competing at height all season. The individual final class is set big. Depending on the region where you compete it may very well be the first time you face that height in competition.
It should have been better, not worse, this year since the USEF changed the way you qualify for Pony Finals. Now your points are awarded based on fence height, rails and number of riders in the class. This was supposed to encourage shows to continue to offer pony jumper classes even if they didn’t fill because a pair could still get points towards pony finals even if they were the only competitors.
I think the over facing is a factor of the fact that the USEF continues to go down the list until they have the extra 12 ponies to compete. For whatever reason, some of the riders with more points choose not to attend and this leaves the door open for riders just starting in the division to go. And that is where the trouble starts. IMHO anyway.
The course was fair for what amounts to a National Championship. More trainers need to rise and train to that occasion. Or riders/parents get help from “real” jumper trainers in addition to their primary trainer. Realize there aren’t many places to prep but even basics are lacking in some…and that’s every year, not just this one. Should not have to feel bad for more then a very few not a substantial number that, frankly, embarrass themselves.
Sorry to say that but…
