Grand Prix for the Rest of Us: An Adult Amateurs’ Survival Guide to your first year at Grand Prix

We’ve all watch countless professionals ride Grand Prix tests seamlessly guiding their equine partners through intricate maneuvers culminating in a perfectly square halt, salute of immobility. But what about we Adult Amateurs with piaffe, passage and tempi changes on the brain? I’m here to tell you, upper level competition isn’t just for hard to pronounce celebrity names.

As a country gal growing up on the Gulf Coast of Texas, my first taste of dressage was set to music through the late night illumination of our television. My world of rodeo queens and barrel racers knew nothing of such refinements. How this horse and rider could be so elegant and flawlessly move to music left me awestruck. It was from that time on I dreamt of dressage at Grand Prix. Here we are several decades removed and I have arrived! Now wait. Where was I going again? It’s been a long trail ride but not one without a plan. Goal, get my USDF Gold Medal.

Grand Prix sounds so ominous and unattainable to most of us and without a clearly defined path, it is. Apart from the sports psychology behind it, defacto our unnerving nerves, there was much I needed to prepare before entering at “A” and gliding into a well timed halt, salute. We have a training plan for our weekly rides but why do so few of us have a competition plan? As an A type personality it’s been my custom to create lists so I wrote down my goal. “Successfully complete Grand Prix, Test B across several competitions culminating in my earning a USDF Gold Medal award.” You see, I already had the Intermediate scores necessary. Hmfp, well that was simple I thought to myself but then I had to plan the steps leading up to that goal! Whether it’s Training Level or Grand Prix, if you want to successfully compete, you need to actualize the goal by designing the steps to it. “Angelea, you need to have a plan.” The simple yet genius words from Kathy Everman still ring in my ears.

How have I gotten through the season? I follow the path to my goal and I keep to a simple list on show days.

Look sharp.
I’ve always felt better when I was confident in my appearance and the dressage ring is no different. Make sure your hair is pulled back underneath a net in a nicely coiffed bun. Next, put on your best face. How do you expect a judge sitting at C to see your beautiful smile coming down the centerline if you don’t have a decent amount of lipstick? No matter how hot it is, I have made tasteful make-up a ritual in my preparations. Try wearing something over your sparkling white breeches until just before the moment you mount your noble stead. And lastly, double check your shadbelly for loose threads, dirt, etc and wipe off the top hat as horse shows are known to be dusty!

Make a schedule.
Most all of us have some sort of written agenda or Smartphone these days. So why should we arrive at a show without a plan? It’s not like we’re at a hunter show waiting outside the ring to pick up the next go. You know if you’re going to ride at 11:04 or 11:12 and, barring any scratches or schedule changes, it’s fairly set in stone. To keep it simple say you ride at noon and you warm-up 30 minutes. In this case you’d mount at 11:25. I usually take an hour to prepare not only my horse but myself and I like to use an extra 10 minutes or so just to hang out and check the gear I cleaned and organized the night previous. This clocks me in for a noon ride time about 10:15. The key is never be rushed or deviate from your schedule.

Hydrate and munch.
It’s hot at most shows, REAL hot! So keep your self hydrated. Hydration is more than simply drinking water prior to your class. Most people don’t know it starts a full 24 hours in advance. So keep plenty of water around for the duration of the show and keep on drinking. There’s no excuse for you to collapse during your warm-up. It’s also crucial to keep healthy snacks around and eat a light breakfast or lunch. You can survive in the most desert like conditions of horse showing as long as you drink water and consume food.

The Friendswood, Texas, native started riding horses when she was 5 and entered her first 4-H competition when she was 10. She earned a United States Dressage Federation silver medal in 2004 and a gold medal in 2006.

Avoid mouthwash. I learnt this one the hard way. Your breath does not need to be perfect for the judges as the closest you’ll really get is passing C and breath is the least of your worries in those moments. So don’t use antiseptic mouthwash before your class as it acts like a sponge and turns the inside of your mouth into one great big cotton ball.

Know your warm-up. We’re dressage gals. We’re schooled in rituals. Circles, and halts, and transitions. Serpentines, and diagonals and changes. Lions, and tigers and bears. Oh my! While I’m not saying choreograph your warm-up just know yourself and your horse well enough that you know what will help you physically and mentally during your test. Warm it up enough so you’re ready to peak when your ride time has come.

Mentally warm-up. We know how to physically ask for an extended trot. We know where our core is. We are prepared for that thrust in the extended canter but how many of us prepare mentally for our test? We need to be like that little train at the top of the hill saying “I know I can. I know I can. I know I can!” Ride your test in your mind. Ride it how you see it and see it perfect. Ride that just right rhythmical, elastic and unfaultable piaffe passage transition. Nothing is as powerful as your mind.

Enjoy it!
Whether you’re entering at A in a collected canter for your first Grand Prix or trotting in at Training Level, it’s all too often that the fun and enjoyment of riding is lost with showing. Shows are there simply to ‘show’ us what we need to work on and while blue ribbons are nice it’s about learning while having a good time.

The bottom line; set your goals. Write them down. Begin your plan to achieve them and the next thing you know you’ll be walking out of the arena on a loose rein patting your lovely partner for a job well done!

So this past weekend Sheryl with FITS was kind enough to invite HorseGirlTV to a trade show in Richmond. The event was quite well attended and we met some really nice folks. I was able to finally meet Patty Lasko (Dressage Today Editor) in person. It was great to connect with people in the industry and hear how cool they thought HorseGirlTV is. It was actually a pretty cool experience for Ex as out of all the people at the event, we ended up seated with some folks from Fredericksburg and her partner is a former Marine who involved in the Korean War. Pretty impressive!

Day two of our weekend excursion was at Monticello, home to Thomas Jefferson. Needless to say the place was spectacular and the geography reminded me of the Williamette Valley (apart from the haze) which allowed for a bit of home sickness. The tour of TJ’s home was really interesting and his designs of the place pretty radical. My favorite in the house was the design of his bed (sorry no photos allowed in the house) but it was basically a archway enough for his bed to fit and one side his dressing room and the other his office. How brilliant I thought! That would be perfect for me. Hah! The carriage house and stables were situated under a walkway connected to the house and were quite cool as well. They were very old English in design and basically offered standing stalls rather than our traditional boxes. All and all it was a really relaxing and educational weekend.

Thanks to TIA at EVF in Auburn, Washington, HorseGirlTV is a proud sponsor of the Octoberfest Hunter Jumper Horse Show! It’s pretty cool to be able to sponsor the Open Hunter Classic Class. I love watching show jumping and admire those brave enough to go over fences!!! Haha!

If you want to learn more about the Octoberfest Horse Show you can go to their website. I’ll put the link at the end of this blog.

Althought it’s NOT in the month of October it’s a pretty cool show at Donida Farm in Auburn, Washington. The atmosphere is very friendly, the venue lively so if you head out to watch make sure and stop by and say hi to Tia and Morgan at Encanto Valley Farm! They are in B Barn and just follow the trail of all the blue ribbons! You guys rock!

http://www.octoberfesthorseshows.com/

My insanely creative (or wait… is that just insane?) editor was gracious enough to put up with me this weekend. I am so excited about launching episode 7 “Patrolling with the Mounted Police” and have this vision in my head of what it will be so he kindly took my two pages of notes and turned them into the best rough cut of HorseGirlTV I’ve seen thus far. I can’t fair for final color correction, sound levels and for it to launch to the world. This one is just too much fun! Thanks for hanging in there with me Brent! You’re amazing and the episode is almost as cool as you are!

More extra! More extra! More, read all about it. HorseGirlTV was featured in the Washington Post. The article has a few errors but it was really nice of Amy to write such a fun piece on HorseGirlTV! I’m pasting the article below in case you want to read it. It was in print and online. I haven’t seen the print version yet but they are sending me a couple copies via the post!

Here’s the article:

New Podcast Trotting Out News for the Horse World

Producer Finds Plenty Of Material in Virginia

By Amy Orndorff, Washington Post Staff Writer, July 29, 2007

Fox hunts. Polo. Horse races.

Perhaps not the first places you would check to see tech-savvy youths, but with a little help from Nokesville podcaster Angelea Kelly, Virginia’s equestrian sports are ready for the YouTube and MySpace generation.

“The idea was to take the horse world, which is a fairly classic community, and add a little MTV to it,” said Kelly, at the reins of HorseGirlTV.

The podcast focuses on all things related to horses, including modern-day cowboys and competitive riding. After producing her first six shows on the West Coast, Kelly moved to Nokesville to profile the mid-Atlantic horse scene.

“When you talk about horse country, you think Kentucky and Virginia,” Kelly said.

Her next podcast, which airs Wednesday on HorseGirlTV.com, explores the Prince William County police horse-mounted patrol. About twice a month, the unit of four officers makes the rounds in neighborhoods, mall parking lots, parks, special events and concerts at Nissan Pavilion.

The mounted unit is just a year old and First Sgt. Kim Chinn hopes the podcast will encourage more people, especially women, to join.

“It’s basically educational, and that appeals to us from a recruiting standpoint,” Chinn, the supervisor, said. “We are always trying to get women into the police force, and there are a lot of women in the horse community.”

Chinn led Kelly through a day in the life of a mounted officer, from patrolling the Manassas Mall to mingling with children in the Irongate community across from the shopping center. Children ran or rode their bikes for a chance to pet the horses.

“It took the ‘force’ out of law enforcement,” Kelly said, because officers on horseback often are seen as more approachable than those in cars.

Kelly, who was reared in the Lone Star State, is the granddaughter of a Texas cowboy and grew up fascinated by horses. Through mowing lawns and saving her allowance, she was able to buy her first pony for $75 when she was 10. Without telling her parents, Kelly saved enough to buy and take care of a horse by the time she was 17.

This same perseverance and entrepreneurship led her from an online-communities job at Yahoo to starting up HorseGirlTV. Although it’s a small operation — boyfriend , a Marine Officer, runs the camera — Kelly has still received positive feedback on iTunes, YouTube and MySpace.

Kelly, the ‘CEO’ (Chief Equine Officer), runs the show out of her Nokesville house with help from and her post production house, Jackhammer Films whom edits the videos and adds animation and music. Her next podcasts all will be locall: one on a bill that could affect horse transportation and another on the role horses play in Manassas battlefield reenactments.

“Virginia was a total attraction,” Kelly said. “This is a mecca for the horse world.”