CHOBHAM & DISTRICT RIDING CLUB

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  2008

Royal Windsor Round 1 qualifiers - 13 December 2009

The British Riding Clubs Royal Windsor Horse Show class is running again and this year the prize for winning is a trip to the Alltech FEI World Equestrian Games 2010 to collect your trophy! For the 2010 qualifiers, British Riding Clubs will run all 4 qualifying rounds. 

Our winners from round one (below) will now go on to compete against the rest of our area in Round 2. The winner of the class will go forward to the final two rounds held at the Royal Windsor Horse Show in May. After Bev Smalldridge's success last year we hope that Southerly, Sophie or Abbie (or all three) will be at Windsor again to represent CDRC and maybe even in Kentucky to collect the prize!

Good luck!!

Class 

Winning CDRC member - Round 1

Orienteering Windsor Park - 10 Oct 2009

The Club’s second orienteering event of 2009 was held in October and saw eight intrepid teams set off at six-minute intervals into Windsor Great Park to follow a 9-mile route set out by Club Secretary Claire Valvona.

As teams followed the direction sheets they had to answer questions to test their observation skills and collect specified treasure along the way.
A highlight for all involved was the stretch that took them down the avenue of trees dressed in their autumn colours alongside The Long Walk towards Windsor Castle. At other points on the route participants enjoyed fine views across Windsor and of the beautiful red deer that live in the Great Park.

Once the teams were returned and refreshed, the results were announced and rosettes presented. The winning team comprised Caroline Shrubb, Joe Brown and James Parker (full results below)

Massive thanks to Claire and Vanessa for organising a fantastic day in Windsor Park on Sunday 11th October for the orienteerers. A fabulous time was had by all, particularly those eight riders who found themselves racing away from the avenue of trees.

August bank holiday show 2009

We thank our hosts, Langshot Equestrian Centre, for opening up their grounds once again to host the CDRC’s Bank Holiday Summer Show.

The show jumping classes proved to be the most popular at this year’s show with 35 competitors contesting the trophy in the 2ft 6. But no-one could catch the speedy time set by Paul Dixon and Just Willam. Extremely impressive and tribute to the time and energy put in to Willam’s recovery from Paul and Rebekah Deacon given that just a couple of years ago, they were advised they may not be able to ride Willam again, let alone jump him.

The show jumping ring also saw a new addition to the line up - the ‘eraser’ class. This is where competitors jump 11 fences, and if they have accrued any faults they can jump the ‘eraser’ fence to cancel out four faults. Member Laura Cackett and Tigers Duke were the first through to the jump off, but couldn’t hold off Romany Bell and Cruz, who took the winners trophy.

Other “firsts” for the day included the oldest ever entrant in our veteran class. At just 34 years young, double the age of the other entrants, Sherrie (owned by Rachel Beakhouse) took 3rd place after showing an impressive trot.

It was also quite a day for Leah Robertson and Duckshill Icon, (pictured) who having won both the lead rein class and the lead rein best rider class, went on to claim Show Champion.

Siobhan James and Romany Legacy, winner of the Ridden Cobs class, were awarded reserve champion to the delight of very proud owner, Kara Over. Both dressage tests were won by Louise Thorne and Bryan.

As always, we send huge thanks and gratitude to the volunteers and committee members who regularly give up their time both on the show day and the day before to set up, judge, steward and pack away. Without them, the club would not be able to continue to run successful shows.

SHOW RESULTS

Hickstead RC Teams of 3 show jumping - July 2009

Chobham’s show jumpers once again ran the Hickstead team of three gauntlet. Out of the 100 teams taking part, Chobham took home 8th position. But it was a close run game that came right down to the last….

Chobham’s teams were drawn to jump 21st, 51st, 70th, 87th and 96th. First up for Chobham and setting the pace in the 85cm class was Sharon Teale and Highland Blaze. Having stepped in at the 11th hour to replace a very poorly Bob Deacon and Showgun, Sharon and Blaze produced a cracking clear round with a good time.

Sharon then briefed the next Chobham riders on the angles to take to get the best time. Next up for Chobham was Sian Rees-Smith and Apache Warrior, who stormed round clear, a massive ten seconds faster than the majority of rounds.

This was followed by more clears for Chobham from Keltic Dream and myself and new member Sarena Harwood and Bionic Bill. An unfortunate slide into jump 5 for Hannah Peyton and Ireland’s Pride left Chobham with 4 out of 5 teams on clear at the end of the first round.

So the pressure was now on all our 95cm riders, but they rose to the challenge. Jackie Teale and Chelsea Girl had a good clean clear round, to take their team on to double clear.

Vanessa Lawes and Gillyflower L didn’t hang around either. With their foot on the gas, they produced an exceptionally quick, stylish round. The combined speed of Vanessa and Sian’s rounds put their team in the lead.

Bev Smalldridge and Dowlands Utopia were the next 95cm Chobham rider to put their team on a double clear. Cruising round on a lovely quick clear, Bev gave us all a heart-in-mouth moment when coming over on a straight line from jump 7, they appeared at the wing of the first part of the double at jump 8!! In a spectacular half pass / leg yield, Bev maneuvered Macca to the right, just far enough to be able to turn one stride from the fence and with amazing scope, ping over both elements of the double, ensuring another clear for Chobham.

Both Caira Jarvis and Corolla and Laura Cackett and Tiger’s Duke popped round the course in great style with just a couple of fences down. At the end of round two there were just 7 of the 100 teams on clear, and 3 of those were Chobham’s teams. But as the weather took a down turn so did our luck…..

It was apparent from the first few rounds that the course didn’t seem quite right for the 105 height. Sophie and Ace were first to run the gauntlet for Chobham. Jumping a cracking round, they were really unlucky to tap a pole late on in the course.

With our second team lying in first, clear with the fastest time, Jo and Vento-W went for a fast round. Having successfully jumped the 1m10 classes at Hickstead the previous month, we all held our breath as they flew round. But the rain was coming down and poor Vento couldn’t quite get his feet down at jump 6 to go on a long stride. 

As the competition drew to a close it became clear that not one of the 100 teams taking part, was going to manage the triple clear, and now we had to just hope for fastest 4 faults.

We finished the day with one team on 4 faults in 8thposition and two teams on 8 faults.

We’d like to say well done to everyone and thank you all for riding for the team. We hope you all enjoyed it and we’ll take Hickstead on again next year. 

CHOBHAM RIDERS BRAVE THE HEAT FOR CDRC'S AIR AMBULANCE SHOW - 26 June 2009

The hot summer sun matched the enthusiasm of local riders as they came to show off their talents at the Chobham and District Riding Club Show on Sunday 28th June.

In a range of classes, from prettiest mare through to various jumping classes, riders put their ponies through their paces and helped raise urgent funds for the Surrey Air Ambulance in the process.

Club Chairman James Parker explained “With it being such a hot day and the ground being hard on horses’ legs because of lack of rain we were worried that people might stay away. But there was a terrific attendance and our judges were delighted at the very high standard of entries.”

Zoe Haigh-Smith and her pony Rose won first prize for being the best in condition and turnout, and another to score high was Ace ridden by Sophie Baker who won the Working Hunter championship.

“Last year we were able to present a large sum to the Surrey Air Ambulance fund and due to the generosity of local riders it looks once again as if we shall be making a good donation to this essential cause,” added Mr Parker. 

Thank you to Bob Deacon for all his efforts in organising the day. Thank you also to all the committee members and show committee members who helped make the day a success.  

Festival of the Hunter, Aston-le-Walls finals 2009

Tiff and Sinbad take 7th place!! 

Top eventing venue – Washbrook Farm, Aston-le-Walls - played host once again to the Festival of the Hunter finals, but this year’s event had a different format. Competitors were required to show jump the first nine fences before heading out onto the cross country course.

The BRC were taking no prisoners with this course either. Although the majority of the ‘questions’ were in the show jump arena followed by a relatively straight forward XC, the scariest fillers were out and 4 of the 9 jumps were set to maximum width. The course designer had given smaller ‘long route’ options which would mean competitors risking time faults. The winning team would undoubtedly be the ones who took all the direct routes. The final ‘question’ was on the cross country course, a corner with two long or three short strides onto a brush jump. To get the line, you were going to have to jump the middle of the corner fence, collect and push on for a big brush upright.

But this combination question had one final element which I feel may have been an oversight. On taking your line through the combination, you arrived outside of the cross country course ‘channel’ into the area designated for competitors exiting the course once completed. A sharp left after the combination was required to select the correct ‘channel’ and finish the course. As a result, many riders ended up the wrong side and incurred costly time penalties as they had to turn back to the top of the channels then back down the correct channel and some were simply eliminated as they did not find the finish. My reason for thinking this was oversight rather than design is that I cannot imagine the BRC intended to have competitors galloping at each other head on!

Regrettably, as one of the first to go, Dream and I were one of the parties who found ourselves in the wrong channel. We did however find our way back to the finish, but incurred a 19 second penalty on an otherwise clear run! I passed the information on to the rest of our team and was just thankful that I had ‘completed’ when I learnt that both the person before and after me had done the same but both had been eliminated for not returning to find the finish. 

As ‘pathfinder’ for the team, Dream and I had given Chobham a clear save for the penalty points and I was devastated to have set the team off on faults. Sadly the course also caught out team members Sian Rees-Smith on Apache Warrior.

But it wasn’t all doom and gloom. Tiffany Manning and Rhydfendigad Sinbad also produced a lovely clear and, remembering to turn hard left after the final cross country combination, came home on the time taking 7th place out of the 104 competitors. 

Rebecca Hill and Mr Macawber also rode a good round and managed to avoid being caught out by the strange XC ending. 

May be it’ll be our year next year – 3rd time lucky? 

Dancing horses Dressage to Music Demo - 10 May 2009

Members from Riding Clubs across Surrey came along to an inspirational training session held by Sara Green on the theme of dressage to music.

Sara (pictured with the microphone) is a founder member of our Club and there is no better person to give an insight and understanding to this fascinating discipline. Four riders were put through their paces as Sara explained to the audience how to compute the beats per minute for each gait and how different styles of music added to the performance of each horse.

The event was hosted at our Secretary Claire Valvona's home and afterwards guests enjoyed a wonderful barbecue provided by Nick and Club member Joe Brown.

And all of this in the most glorious early summer sunshine!

Jo and Sara

Orienteering - Chobham Common - 26 April 2009

The long ride in the heat takes its toll, even on the winners. 

Left to right: Sophie Baker and Ace, Sian Rees-Smith and Patch, Sara Clark and Harley, Rebecca Hill and Macawber

Best wishes, James

Munstead Easter Training - April 2009