Show Stories- The good, the bad, and the ugly

[Spudsmyguy]

I posted this one before but here goes.

At a dressage schooling show with my young mustang who hadn’t had much exposure to the show environment. We started out fine, she was a little wiggly but not naughty. We were doing our canter circle at A and she comes to a screeching halt. There was a jump standard that was stashed against the wall just outside the ring and she was sure it was a monster. She stood there and stared at it with alarm bells going off in her head. I finally got her moving again but she gave it the hairy eyeball every time we had to pass it. Judge’s comment - “Loss of forward motion.” LOL

[clanter]

all Bay horses look alike said the State Vet who was at the show to drug test random and division winners …he actually escorted the horse from the show ring to her stall, asked for horse’s papers so he could ID the horse… looks at the paperwork then at the horse and turns to say when did we switch horses on him as the paperwork can not be of the horse he has in front of him.

Yes it is we say, he say no it isn’t as this horse here can not be 19 years old, But oh yes she is

Finally had to get the show manager to come to the stall to positively identify the horse as being the horse on the papers

and his rely was all Bays look alike

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I once was tasked with checking Coggins papers as horses arrived… handed the paperwork for a Bay Mare … told the person Wrong paperwork, they said it was the correct paperwork look here the markings are correct to even the white right front hoof… yes I see that but this horse is not a Mare, look here

[anon40672407]

@clanter

yes I see that but this horse is not a Mare, look here

HAHA!

[Arelle]

2012 - first trip to the APHA World Show.

Had my trusty gelding in the showmanship and I was full of nerves.

Went in, nailed the pattern. We only had to be Top 15 to make it back to finals. I walked out of the gate towards my trainer waiting for her to tell me how amazing it was.

Except, instead, she told me that my horse had been jogging during the walk portion of the pattern.

I had been so nervous, so focused on keeping my chin up and my eyes locked with the judge and my shoulders back that I somehow missed my 17hh gelding doing the world’s slowest trot shuffle next to me as I walked… with authority… to my set up and inspection.

The good news is, we came back the next year and won it. And ever since, I’m super cautious about ensuring the animal on my lead is actually walking like they’re supposed to.

[swmorse]

Not a horse show, but Hanoverian mare inspection. We’re walking all the mares around the ring together. I am almost running with mine thinking wow, we are really moving! This is a grey mare and the inspector says ‘grey mare, do you need a tail?’ I’m flabbergasted so I say ‘uh, yeah, thanks’. I’m walking by some people on the rail and I say ‘really, we’re not going fast enough?’ They’re laughing’no,you’re crawling’ I’m ‘gosh I felt like I was running’. They’re still laughing’no you’re pretty slow’

[exvet]

I think my most ‘memorable’ show story that covers it all was back in 2006 when I showed at the state championships in first level as an adult amateur. It was a huge class and I was one of the first riders to go. It was in an indoor arena and my horse at the time could get pretty tense in that particular indoor. He had been doing reasonably well at the level - mid to high 60s. I think our median in All Breeds was somewhere around 66 or 67 that year. I was only showing the one horse luckily because that morning for breakfast I had yogurt. Never thought anything about it because it was a normal routine for me and the stuff was in date, tasted fine. Well you guessed it within an hour of hitting the show grounds I started to feel nauseous which except for morning sickness I have never, ever gotten nauseous at a horse show. I had food poisoning and was experiencing every lovely symptom with it. My coach at the time told me that I looked pretty darn pale with a green hue. My warm up was less than stellar and I wasn’t even sure I was going to stay on the horse because I was sweating profusely (not a hot day) and definitely feeling light headed. I sucked it up and when in and rode the test. I felt the test was rather lack luster but correct. I came out and there were somewhere around 14-15 tests to go. I handed my horse to my daughter who was there and went and crawled into the cab of my truck to die. About an hour later my coach came to check on me. I was still dry heaving and told her I was going to just load the horse and go home. I asked her to pick up my test for me and give it to me at my next riding lesson. She informed me that I was sitting in first place and would not be going anywhere. It seemed like forever to find out that I had won the class/championship…and was required to put polos on the horse and ride in the awards ceremony (and get pictures, ugh!) How I managed to stay on my horse, who decided to be a saint that day, and not puke on the presenter of the award to this day I do not know but I still have the picture to prove it. My daughter and I loaded the horse and I drove home with the window down for obvious reasons…had to stop at least two times on the 40 minute drive. For a horse that was known to be ‘special’ take care of me (hell I had no tension, I was too weak to be stiff, nervous or over think things) like that was huge. That was the first of multiple championships for he and I over the subsequent years. He’s now 24 and still going strong with quite nice one-tempis but also still very, very ‘special’ especially at shows LOL.

[demidq]

At my first dressage show, walk trot test with my very green 5yo, a horse ran past our ring dragging a screaming woman, I mean literally dragging as she had wound the lead around her hand and couldn’t let go. Anyway, my sweet mare cocks an ear and continues beautifully with the job at hand, and we won our class. I ,however, was so rattled that I completely forgot my test in our second class. How can you forget a walk trot test???
Next show I outdid myself by screwing up my test twice WITH A READER!