Gymkhana, today! Pictures
Gymkhana - The local youth Rodeo. Click here for pictures. Click on pictures to make them bigger.
Last Gymkhana, two weeks ago, was an unmitigated disaster. The weather was wicked, blowing duststorms which ranged from 25-50 miles per hour, non-stop. Dust everywhere. Horses flipping out, going over gates, fences, their owners. One of Sam's friends was so badly hurt when she was thrown and had her leg stepped on, that she still couldn't ride this time around. Sam's pony was a turd, Sam had a meltdown, and we left early because her pony began limping.
Today was much better. We got the donkey loaded, and she was really good the whole time. Sam's pony, after some tack adjustments and my riding her in barrels, underwent a considerable attitude change that extended to Sam as well, so Sam's tension went down quite a bit. Red was wonderful, didn't really put much effort into dumping me and except for spooking of this and that, she did well. I rode the donkey in the 'cow barrels' and I think I made a new record of longest time - over four minutes - for an adult. The donkey is young, very green, had never seen all the activity and noise, and Donkey Mode is to stop and swivel those wonderful ears at whatever it is that probably contains donkey-eating monsters in it (barrels, fluttering ribbons, grandstands...). Funniest, is that she was afraid of her own shadow, when the sun was behind us, and the dirt in the arena had been really roiled up, so it made some really odd shapes.
We did the dollar race, which was the 'Jackpot' - you had to ride your animal bareback, with a dollar between your leg and the animal, around a barrel and back. Sam and I opted for the donkey, as she has the fattest back of the crew, and the donkey humored us by not dumping us.
The spouse took pictures. :)
Sam doing the hourglass pattern.
Hard to see, but... This is me riding the donkey bareback, while trying to keep a dollar between my leg and the donkey. I think she was actually loping at this point. I did, in fact, make it back with the dollar. :)
This was me having the discussion with Whirlwind about who was going to be running the show. It was a 'time only' run on barrels. I was trying to figure out if the problem was with the kid or if the pony really didn't have a clue what she was supposed to be doing. The pony knew what she was supposed to be doing. I've never gone around barrels so fast, even though, as shown here, we weren't even tight with the barrel. It was /so/ much fun, I was shaking for a good few minutes. And after this, Sam must have realized that the pony really /could/ do this, and Sam's BS-O-Meter got recalibrated and things went much better.
Sam, when she did barrels before I had my little Come to Jesus meeting with the pony. This was the only time that the pony was going in the direction that she was supposed to be going, when Sam wanted her to do that. Sam is incredible. This pony can really be a Class A, scary, fast, and very strong turd, and Sam just stayed calm and cool and collected. She impresses me, that kid.
Check it out! I'm near the barrel this time! Sweet Red.
Woo! We almost look like we have a clue! The yellow thing is a barrel.
Last Gymkhana, two weeks ago, was an unmitigated disaster. The weather was wicked, blowing duststorms which ranged from 25-50 miles per hour, non-stop. Dust everywhere. Horses flipping out, going over gates, fences, their owners. One of Sam's friends was so badly hurt when she was thrown and had her leg stepped on, that she still couldn't ride this time around. Sam's pony was a turd, Sam had a meltdown, and we left early because her pony began limping.
Today was much better. We got the donkey loaded, and she was really good the whole time. Sam's pony, after some tack adjustments and my riding her in barrels, underwent a considerable attitude change that extended to Sam as well, so Sam's tension went down quite a bit. Red was wonderful, didn't really put much effort into dumping me and except for spooking of this and that, she did well. I rode the donkey in the 'cow barrels' and I think I made a new record of longest time - over four minutes - for an adult. The donkey is young, very green, had never seen all the activity and noise, and Donkey Mode is to stop and swivel those wonderful ears at whatever it is that probably contains donkey-eating monsters in it (barrels, fluttering ribbons, grandstands...). Funniest, is that she was afraid of her own shadow, when the sun was behind us, and the dirt in the arena had been really roiled up, so it made some really odd shapes.
We did the dollar race, which was the 'Jackpot' - you had to ride your animal bareback, with a dollar between your leg and the animal, around a barrel and back. Sam and I opted for the donkey, as she has the fattest back of the crew, and the donkey humored us by not dumping us.
The spouse took pictures. :)
Sam doing the hourglass pattern.
Hard to see, but... This is me riding the donkey bareback, while trying to keep a dollar between my leg and the donkey. I think she was actually loping at this point. I did, in fact, make it back with the dollar. :)
This was me having the discussion with Whirlwind about who was going to be running the show. It was a 'time only' run on barrels. I was trying to figure out if the problem was with the kid or if the pony really didn't have a clue what she was supposed to be doing. The pony knew what she was supposed to be doing. I've never gone around barrels so fast, even though, as shown here, we weren't even tight with the barrel. It was /so/ much fun, I was shaking for a good few minutes. And after this, Sam must have realized that the pony really /could/ do this, and Sam's BS-O-Meter got recalibrated and things went much better.
Sam, when she did barrels before I had my little Come to Jesus meeting with the pony. This was the only time that the pony was going in the direction that she was supposed to be going, when Sam wanted her to do that. Sam is incredible. This pony can really be a Class A, scary, fast, and very strong turd, and Sam just stayed calm and cool and collected. She impresses me, that kid.
Check it out! I'm near the barrel this time! Sweet Red.
Woo! We almost look like we have a clue! The yellow thing is a barrel.