Sandhills of Nebraska
My granddaughters ride “eastern” and I’ve been to a couple of horse shows near Raleigh, so I couldn’t resist going to a western horse show. Such a difference! The clothes, the saddles, the whole event is different. Many of these kids ride horses to get the mail, ride horses to help with cattle branding and artificial insemination, and sometimes ride on fence inspection. So they ride a lot and it’s real.
The Trail Ride Event
The trail riding event begins with the horse and rider outside the arena and ends with the rider leaving the arena. I want Annie and Rachel to see how a nine-year old girl does it perfectly!
The rule: the rider must never let go of the gate from the time she unlatches it until the time she firmly latches it again!
She approaches slowly, positions her horse carefully, and then unlatches the gate.
The pushes the gate open and begins walking the horse through.
Notice the hand on the end of the gate.
Hand still one the gate, she pivots the horse around.
Closes the gate,
Note she has had to back up the horse to get in position to finish.
She latches the gate and
Now lets go of the gate and addresses the judges as she begins the rest of the ride.
I’m going to repeat the process as she leaves the arena after the other required parts of the trail ride.
Approach,
Unlatch,
Backup,
Pass through,
Pivot with the hand still on the fence,
Close and latch,
Ride away!!!!
She makes it look easy, but it’s not! At least half of the riders had problems and several couldn’t do it!