It’s Saturday night, the cross-country course has been walked, and there’s not much to be done now other than run through it several more times in my head.
When I walk a course I start by standing in the box an focusing on my key thoughts for the ride. I won’t walk out of the box until I’m totally focused on what I need to do to help my horse succeed. Sometimes I stand in the box for 30 seconds, sometimes several minutes; I think I stood in the box at The Fork for 10 minutes before my final walk.
The horse I am riding tomorrow is super over the fences but he is spooky and gets distracted between the fences. David worked with me this spring to make sure I am always being very clear about what I want him to do rather than just reacting to what is happening underneath me. I think it’s an interesting thought in general that we as riders spend too much time reacting to something going wrong rather than preventing the problem by telling our horse to do the right thing in the first place. Now about the course.
Fence #1 is labeled “stairway to heaven,” which, depending on how you look at it, is either menacing or just a way to get a great song stuck in your head for the five and a half minute course, which, incidentally is shorter than the song itself. Just don’t jump #1 like a Led Zepplin.
Fence two is a table, followed by the corners at #3. And by corners I mean two corners in one element.
Wait, whaaa?
Like one big black deadly bow tie.
#4 is another table, followed by the bank complex at five and six, which is a bank up to two strides then a drop followed by a coop on a right turn. Then the water complex, then the Trakehner at #9, blah blah–enough writing more pictures!
Looking at the half coffin makes me think about how all the big events never call them ‘coffins’ anymore. I guess when someone gets lit up and the newspapers write “Joe Shmo was injured at the Rolex coffin” it makes non-eventers ask too many questions.
After a table at eleven, #12AB is two *coops on a one-stride
Then it’s a long line of jumps at #13, #14, #15, and a slight bend to #16–as in gymnastics style except more strides and with a gully mixed in. Just trust me. Seventeen is a water filled ditch and wall, eighteen is an oxer, and then 45 seconds of cantering to #19 and the finish…
If you don’t respect the last fence either Karen or Dorothy will shoot you…so always respect the last fence.
Go eventing.
