On the third day, I was showing a 4 year old, 17 hand quarter horse gelding in a sale horse class. While he was a gorgeous animal, and an ideal candidate for the AQHA hunter under saddle circuit, he was also (unbeknownst to me) completely herd bound. The way the sale horse classes work is that all the horses line up on one side of arena, and then one by one, each sale horse is given 5 minutes to strut his or her stuff. When it was my turn, I confidently made my way to the center of the arena, and for a moment it seemed we were going to have an excellent showing. That was not to be. Soon enough the horse realized he was no longer with the other horses. My steering and breaks instantly vanished, and I became no more influential than the saddle on his back. Before I knew it, I was on the ground, and the gelding was happily strutting back to other horses.
He soon came to a stop next to a miniature mule that he had befriended during the entire 15 minutes we had spent in line. I climbed back up all 17 hands of him, still shaky from the adrenaline pumping through my veins, thinking of the epinephrine pathway I had memorized in biochemistry. I used up the remainder of my time trotting in a circle near the line of other horses.
The trainer was impressed with my toughness and fearlessness in the situation and asked me to ride the horse again at an upcoming horse show. Because of my previously mentioned
The next weekend I met the trainer and her team of horses at the show and prepared to ride. My giant QH friend showed his ability for airs above the ground in the warmup, so I prepared for an exciting day. I was pleasantly surprised when our first class passed without incident, and then even more surprised when my name was announced after the words "in first place." The pattern of good behavior and top placings continued. Later in the day, we were named the hi-point combination for our division and handed a shiny, silver goblet. Now that's what I call redemption!
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