Team Dressage on Saturday 28th of February 2009, Ingliston
by Kirsty Allison

The weather held up well for this year's team Dressage at Ingliston despite the start of the month being a blanket of snow! Time to practise was definetly short, resulting in one week to run over the test before we went. With entries to be in by the start of February, and a team short of a rider, it was a very tense last minute request to ask Catriona Vinson if she could join the team to which she happily replied yes! . This year we had two teams representing Strathendrick Riding Club. We had Strathendrick Team A which comprised of ; Preliminary Riders - Lorna Brand and Nicola Hutchison, Novice Riders- Katie Wilson and Jackie Gillespie. Strathendrick Team B comprised of ; Preliminary Riders - myself-Kirsty Allison and Catriona Vinson, Novice Riders- Liz McQuillan and Julia Cross.

The Saturday morning was very calm and sedate depite everyone's anxiety the previous day- trying to remember the test while practising and riding the movements accuratly. Chubbles' losing a front shoe didn't help matters, leaving me with a quick phone call and a beg to my farrier to come out and replace it. The journey to Ingliston was a quiet 40minutes and on arrival there were many large posh and polished horses warming up. Our team tests were set to be outside in the outdoor arenas, which I was quite happy about as Chubbles goes better outdoors. There were no flower pots outdoors either which was a big releif! (I was later to realise that my arena was right next to part of the building site, with workmen walking about on scaffolding!) .

Chubbles warmed up quite well, he seemed to be very interested in every horse that came into the arena though, especially another piebald pony that he couldn't take his eyes off! Not very re-assuring considering I needed his full attention, but we managed to run through all 3 paces and a few circles before having 5minutes to chill before the test began. Catriona had the same idea and we had a chat before we went in- great way to calm the nerves! I remember our conversation being something along the lines of - 'there's so many posh horses here.... ah well let's give it a go!'

We were called in to stand by for our test. My arena was running 5 minutes late for some reason, so I got a chance to see some of Nicola and Lorna's, and the start of Catriona's test which was quite funny as the arena next to her beeped the car horn to start someone else, and Fonz left about 3ft in the air! I remember standing waiting to go to the arenas, thinking very calm and positively yet I could feel my heart beating quite fast. Chubbles was interested in turning his head in all directions to see what was going on. When we finally go into the arenas, we were allowed to walk around our arena before we started. After what seemed like an eternity, the car horn beeped and we headed off down the centre line with a rather forward going trot, so much so I couldn't turn as discreetly as I would have like at C! I was very pleased with the trot work in the test, despite being marked down for not being accurate at some of my markers. I felt there was a lot of cantering in the test too but overall I was very pleased with Chubbles as he wasn't naughty and he didn't spook at anything(like the markers or the white boards).

Just as we were about to leave, we tried to get our test sheets but unfortunatly they weren't giving them out until everyone had been, that meant not untill about 6pm! Being 12:30pm , it would be too long to wait, so fortunatly we managed to get them picked up later. I was VERY shocked to find out I got 64% in the test and came 6th place overall in the prelim test, which meant I had a qualifier too! Needless to say Chubles got endless carrots! The results as are follows:

Preliminary Riders; Novice Riders;
Nicola Hutchison - 48% Katie Wilson - 68%
Lorna Brand - 52% Julia Cross - 62%
Catriona Vinson - 56% Jackie Gillespie - 65%
Kirsty Allison - 64% Liz McQuillan - 57%

Team placing(out of 20teams)
Strathendrick Team A - 17th
Strathendrick Team B - 19th

So unfortunately we did not all qualify as a team, but well done to everyone that took part!

When I heard our riding club was looking for team members to represent them at dressage, I immedietly thought no way, Chubbles and I are not good enough for that. Nicola Hutchison had decided to put her name down for it and informed me they were looking for more members to join, so I finally thought I might aswell give it a go. With a good score and 6th place overall in the prelims, it just goes to show that anyone can give it a go. This test was my fourth test in the 4 years I've had Chubbles, you don't have to have a wide experience of dressage. It's great fun to be part of a team and know you're representing your club, so yeah, give it a go!