STC - Recreational/Comp. Trail Horses All Breeds Specializing in Gaited Horses

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Well the 2007 season started off with a bang! The Warner Springs NATRC ride was Fabulous! 21 miles for Novice B...

My GPS was as follows:

20.9 Miles

5.29 Moving time

1.51 Stopped time (1.0 lunch 2-15 minute P&Rs 21 minutes delays)

7.20 Total time

3.8 Moving average

5.2 Gaiting average

11.8 Max. speed

The Camp ground was very nice although we parked next to the hwy without thinking about it (sleeping in a tent made it quite noisy Friday night) Weather was prefect on Saturday although the night before was FREEZING cold I didn't sleep at all and even Mark complained in the morning and when Mark complains about cold ITS COLD! LOL 33 degrees at 5 AM BRRRRR poor Danni was not a happy camper! I think a small RV may be in sight in years to come... It warmed up really quick when the sun came up though and I left camp at 7:30am with just a poloshirt and sweatshirt, breeches helmet and half chaps it was still chilly but OK. By lunch at the 10 mile mark we were in just shirts and it was close to 70 NICE!

We rode the Pacific Crest Trail through out the entire competition on a single track trail through cattle country where as we were within 10 feet of the herds, RC wanted to go chase cows here and there but a quick refocus on the trail and we were back on track LOL, There were really pretty wooded glens and creeks, open valleys and moderate hills only about 500 foot evaluation changes. Some of the single tracks in the hills were a bit scary with only about 2 feet of trail wide and a 400 foot drop off on one side into the creek or valley below YIKES. One point on the map was "Eagle Rock" we were told we could see it on the way back and I spotted it and showed Karen very cool! Ride management set the pace up a little because we didn't have the hill work to do so we were able to do a lot more gaiting and that was a total blast! RC hit a smooth as glass ambling gait at about 4.5 miles per hour and we just covered the ground... A couple of riders even said they were jealous LOL and a few asked what RC's name was saying "Oh this is him or this is Red Cloud"... I guess my boy is starting to get a reputation, good or bad I'm not quite sure which ;-)

Although I didn't take a picture of the trail gates we had to walk through and step over I found a gate picture on the net I changed a little so it looks similar and wanted to explain how the bottom metal bar is stationary and in most cases just below the horses knees in height so they had to really trust us and pick up their feet and legs to get over them. RC banged his shins a couple of times and received a clumsy comment on his score card (deserved) because I didn't help him enough by looking up and over the gate to help him think about just moving forward through it. We both got the hang of them really well either riding or in hand walkovers by the end of the ride. I'd like to add that this was the first time we had to deal with a stepover gate that was open under the bar. All of ours at home are like doubled up rail road ties so they're high but solid and much easier to judge how to walk over. I thought they were a great obstacles and made both the horse and rider think about what they were doing as a team! Good Job to the course designers!

My student Karen Dayton and her mare Shasta took 3rd in horsemanship and a completion in horse out of 15 riders... and I am so pleased with Karen because she had to make a very hard decision on whether to ride in her new saddle which still needed minor fitting adjustments. Three hours in the saddle has been OK but we knew 5 1/2 might get some back soreness (which it did) and was just enough of a point deduction to keep her out of the ribbons BUT we know for sure what needs to be fixed and that's great...

RC and I took 1st in horsemanship and 2nd in horse, with Highpoint Horse and Rider team (Our first together) I am just thrilled with him and I'm glad I am giving him one more year in Novice B before we move to Competitive Pleasure next year in 2008...