Chiltern & Thames Rider Magazine - The Voice of the Region

Your Feedback from the Blaze CT Rider Dressage Championsips at Patchetts on Saturday 7th November

Would just like to say thank you to you and your staff for putting on a nice show. It’s a pity that not everyone got a rosette for just getting to the championship. Thank you for the hospitality given; I enjoyed the dressage to music but it’s a pity it was not split as it seemed unfair that we were going up against novice,elementary & medium tests when we are only doing prelim,maybe next time classes can be split. Also like to say a big thank you to Jan for the nice compliments regarding Gym. Many thanks
ps See you all at Keysoe.

Terry & Carole Cole

Editor's note: Following feedback from competitors, we will have Finalist rosettes at Keysoe.
At the summer champs next year, we are having two music classes Terry, so you don't have to go up against Elementary and Medium. We will have Intro, Prelim and Novice on day two and Novice, Elementary and Medium on day one.

Thank you for organising such a well-run and enjoyable event.

Just one suggestion if I may. I thought it would be nice if everyone who qualified actually received a qualifying rosette which a lot of championship shows do. Given the cost of buying a C&T card and the entry fee for the championship show and the slim chance of quite a lot of competitors actually being placed (well at least in the Prelim classes), a rosette would at least reward their efforts for getting there. Just a thought……..

Editor's reply: We did this a couple of years ago and most people left them behind which was such a waste. But if you want finalist rosettes we are happy to award them as you all deserve recognition for getting to the finals

I wanted to write and thank you and all the members of staff at Chiltern and Thames Rider for all their hard work in preparing for the Blaze CT Rider Summer Dressage Championships.

This was my daughter’s first time to compete at a Chiltern and Thames championship show and I felt that it was important that you and all your staff, the team at Patchetts EC and of course, the judges, were aware that the work obviously put into organising this event was really well received and the day was fantastic.

My daughter had qualified for the Prelim Restricted, and decided that she would love the opportunity to have a go and enter the Dressage to Music class. This meant that we were at the venue all day, so had a sable booked for the pony, which enabled us to enjoy all the classes. What could have been a very long day was one of the best events that we have ever been to, very well run, with beautiful rosettes and great prizes and even at 8pm, everyone still had a smile!

We now have to hope we can qualify for the Mountain Horse Winter Dressage at the College EC as we are sure that it will be a great event too. Thanks again to you all for the hard work; we are sure everyone would agree it was a great day.

I just wanted to say thanks for a really well organised championships. It was fabulous to have results going up almost immediately, commentary and a real championship atmosphere. We were delighted to just squeak into the prize-giving for the music (being =6th) having narrowly missed out in the prelim (coming 7th) and it made a long day worthwhile, although I think my pony really thought he should have been in bed by that time! We finally made it back to the yard at 9.30pm back down in Surrey, but it was well worth the trip! Just trying to decide now if Keysoe really is a trip too far!

Many thanks for sorting out two wonderful 4th prizes. I am wearing the fleece now as I type - it's great. I was so chuffed with how the old boy went on Saturday and sorted out a picture 4592 in the final prize giving of Raffs wearing both 4th place rossies. You know he's very laid back, well I'd just clipped him and it was very cold, plus loads of fireworks going off, so I thought that if this combination can't move his backside then I'm a useless rider. Anyway he was a star.
Many thanks to both you and Sue for such a fabulous day.
Love
Jackie Barker

Congratulations to Chiltern Rider, Blaze Clothing and Antonia and her team at Patchetts for the success of the Championships. There was a friendly, helpful atmosphere, excellent knowledgeable judges and efficient scoring. It all appeared to run to time and the prizes looked fantastic.

Thank you for organising such a lovely day. It was lovely to be at Patchetts with the splendid facities. It would have been nice for the non rosette winners to go home with a rosette for reaching the Championships - perhaps next year?

I've just read your lovely comments about Mr Rafferty on your website. Thank you so much. We had a fantastic day at Patchetts with everything flowing so smoothly. As you know Raffs is a very laid back 25 year old gentleman and to get the best out of him you have to rattle his cage a little. So on the day before the competition, I gave him what has become known as his 'go faster' clip. My time for the elementary wasn't until 6.20pm and by that time it was very very cold. So not only did Raffs have a draft up his backside, we also had fireworks to work in with and that combination certainly did the trick. What was absolutely fantastic was doing my dressage test to the freestyle music in the next arena. By some fantastic coincidence the trot work fitted Raff's trot perfectly.

Mr Rafferty has only started to go sideways (half pass) seriously in the last couple of years and to be honest he does struggle and it often turns into leg yield or even worse deteriorates to a diagonal line, but at your Championships he just felt fantastic, so much so that I felt quite emotional at the end of the test. I really appreciated the fact that both you and Janet took the time to watch his tests.

I was really really chuffed to receive a rosette in both classes and you are absolutely right in saying that the music by Aaron Copland 'Fanfare to the Common Man' made the prize giving special on entering the arena. A final special thank you to Janet who saved me two different 4th prizes and held Mr Rafferty while I tried them on in the freezing cold to check for fit. The Shires quilted waistcoat and lined fleece are fabulous and I've been riding in them continually.

Once again many thanks.

Pleasure Jackie. We hope to see you and Raffs for many more years yet, please God.
What are you feeding him? I am sure one of the feed companies would sponsor him!

Hello Sue

I am very pleased the event went well. I am sorry but I did not bring Ravel's Bolero as the competition was running late into the evening and I was informed that there are lots of fireworks going off around Patchetts. I hope you understand from a safety point of view this was not appropriate for us.

Bernadettte

Bernadette, we are going for the Sunday night next year to avoid the fireworks. Sue

Following a dialogue with Bernadette, can I confirm what the CTR champs are aimed at.

The restricted classes prelim and novice are the exclusive domain of unaffiliated riders.

We welcome unaffiliated and affiliated riders alike in the other classes. So long as you do not have more points than the rules stipulate, we welcome BD riders and non BD riders. Sue

As requested some feedback from the dressage champs: it was great! Really well organized, prompt results and great facilities. The only complaint (which is a standard one for Patchetts) is that I ended up having to park ‘over the bridge’ which made life difficult as a competitor travelling alone. I had to ‘abandon’ my horse on the lorry in order to pick up numbers, check results etc. which was far from ideal – and meant I almost missed the Novice presentation as I under-estimated the length of time to get back to the main arena. I did manage to move back into the main car park later during the day which made life lots easier. The only other request would be to move the champs a bit further away from Bonfire Night if possible to minimize the impact of fireworks.

Had a fabulous time though & delighted to be second in the Novice & seventh in the Elementary despite having a rotten cold. Sully definitely goes better when I can’t interfere! Regarding Finalist Rosettes. Yes please! Still treasure mine from Keysoe two years ago and while I’ve been lucky enough to go home with a rosette from each class entered since that day, knowing that you get a nice rosette (and the rosettes are fab!) can be the difference to competing or not if you know that you’ve had a lucky qualification.

Nichola Peace & Ausdan Sularis

Well done Nichola. We are running on the Sunday night 7th Nov next year so there may be a few fireworks but most of the bangs and flashes will have happended on Friday 5th and Sat 6th. The parking is always an issue with Patchetts but they are so good in all other areas, I think we will have to put up with this. I know it gets expensive but you could hire a stable for the day so that you don't have to go back to the lorry between classes and presentations.

Just a thought. If it is too extravagent, ignore me!