(“No, dear, not yet.”)

Astonishing to me: the fact that over 60 horses were entered at our Region Three Finals in Prix St. George. A number like this would not shock me at a Wellington CDI, but these were pretty much all residents of the Southeast, and almost half of them were adult amateurs. This number was all the more impressive in that the U. S. Dressage Festival of Champions was being held concurrently just up the road in Lexington, Kentucky and bled off a certain number of competitors who went there instead.

A quick calculation – figure conservatively an average of $60,000 per horse, that’s $3.6 million worth of horse flesh just in that level. Whenever your local county commissioners are turning up their nose at the financial impact of the horse industry, you should hold up numbers like those for them to consider.

In the You Damn Kids Get Off My Lawn Department, let me put on my cranky judge’s hat and pose the question, “Just how bad can your horse be before you decide you don’t belong in the show ring with it?” Here I am not referring to the occasional “bad day.” That can happen to anyone. Nor am I referring to a “work in progress” being re-made after suffering through some difficult history. (Although depending on the severity of the problem, I might suggest that a schooling show is the right venue for a horse like this.)

Here are two examples of horses that probably should not have been brought to recognized shows. Number one: a very green horse with a very timid, novice rider who let the horse run away with her all the way around the perimeter of all three arenas, and then once finally in the ring was unable to get him within five meters of the sideboards. It’s not that I am unsympathetic to her plight, but it can’t do such a rider’s confidence any good to be put in that kind of circumstance. That’s when it’s a trainer’s duty to pull her aside and say, “No, dear, not yet.”

Number two: an adult amateur competing in Fourth Level Test Three – the hardest test before going to PSG – on a horse with no flying changes. I don’t mean a horse that is “late behind” sometimes. I mean a horse that literally can’t make a flying change of lead. At this level the changes are so important that if the horse can’t execute them at all, the score for each one cannot be better than a 3, and we are instructed at judges forums not to go higher than 3 for Submission either. Again, that’s where the trainer must step in—In this case, not just to take her back to the schooling shows but realistically to keep the horse at Second Level until the changes have at least a chance of working. This incident took place at a championship show being judged by a panel. I can tell you that neither of us enjoyed giving the low scores which that horse earned. Judges want to be positive, generous, and rewarding, but you have to give us a chance!