Kapelstraat 12  5595 GK  Leende

Report JIM! Nice fifth place in freestyle!

Dear all,

Last Thursday I went to the Dutch international show Jumping Indoor Maastricht together with Marcel, Stan and Showboy to compete at international small tour level. 

We arrived in the afternoon and we unpacked everything first. Showie was comfortable in his stall. After 5 PM we had the possibility to ride in the main arena so we did. It is not always easy as they are still busy building up things but it is a good practice. 

Maastricht is a very nice show with a great
atmosphere. The warming up arena is situated in the exhibitors village so there is much to see for the horses but it's very special. 

Thursday evening when Stan already slept I made all the tack ready and I groomed Showie. Showie is always very sweet and he enjoys all the attention during these days. 

Friday morning at 9 AM the vet check was on the program. As always Showie passed without problems. After the vet check the drawing has taken place. We were fifth to go. The class started at 10.45 AM so I immediately started to plat Showie. My parents had arrived as well so they watched Stan. 

When we arrived at the warming up arena we panicked for a second: half of the warming up arena was needed for the vet check of the show jumpers! And about 200 kids were present with a lot of balloons!  
Ha ha!

Fortunately I could keep 
Showie focussed although I felt some tension. We had made a good plan for my warming up but some parts were not so good as he was a bit distracted. We decided to walk for a while before we would take of the boots. All the sudden I had to go into the arena for my test. I was convinced this was not correct as Marlies van Baalen was fourth to go. The organization forgot to tell there was a new order as Marlies had to ride in a show and she couldn't make it as fourth starter. So we quickly took off all bandages and we went into the arena. It's no excuse but the preparation was not super because of this. 

Once we were in the arena 
Showie was a bit reserved and that caused some small things. When I finished the test I concluded I could solve all these little things so that we didn't make big mistakes. The score, 66%, was very disappointing. There were big differences in the judges' marks and rankings. 

I have to say I couldn't understand this and I really was sick of it. I know I lost points as I couldn't work on the details so much so I had to evaluate this before my freestyle Saturday. 

On Friday afternoon we went to town for a while and had dinner. Afterwards we hand walked Showie and cleaned the tack. 

On Saturday I was fifth to go at 
1.39 PM. In the morning at 7.30 AM we had sound check and then we walked Showie and groomed him :)

I knew that it would be difficult to make some progress in ranking after the first day. There were many good competitors. I sort of deleted the first test in my head and I made a new plan for the warming up. During this warming up Showie felt great. He was a bit sharper to my aids. He was hot but I had control. 

My feeling was great in the freestyle! Finally we had the wow-feeling back! He was almost too hot but I could handle it when I compromised a bit. For instance after the halt I had to start immediately and I went from walk to canter a bit earlier otherwise he would have started to do piaffe, ha ha!

The complete test I focussed on my awareness and I rode small pirouettes so we were very satisfied. I had a great feeling and we were in the lead with 71,1%. 

Marlies van Baalen won the freestyle and 
Diederik van Silfhout finished second. Two competitors got 71,3% and that was just a bit more than my score so we came fifth.

We were super happy and went home with a good feeling! 

As it looks now this was my last small tour kur with 
Showie. Today he will have a day off and tomorrow we will start again with our way to the Grand Prix! 

Lots of love, 


Joyce