Nothing like some deadline to put a fire under my feet. I have a ride coming up, October 4, just 4 days before my birthday – which is always an auspicious time for me. 
It is the ASPIRE Therapeutic Riding Program Benefit Ride in Waterloo, Iowa. I have a 10 minute slot in which to ride to music of my choosing and do whatever fancies my taste, and it has been requested that I do so using one of my Bashkir Curly horses…
For the interest of safety, and attractive and entertaining outcome, I have chosen my former stallion turned exceptional gelding, *Y.S. Tanjobi. A little bit about Jobi… I bought him back in 2000 as a 2 year old stallion from Trish Rosborough of Yanagi Stables in Ontario, Canada. We stood him as a stallion until 2004 when I opted to get out of breeding horses and focus more closely on riding and training. I entertained thoughts of selling him as a stallion, but in the end couldn’t part ways with him and gelded him for my own riding horse instead. I have never for a moment regretted it!
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The original photos from *Tanjobi’s for sale ad as a long yearling which stole my heart. |
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Jobi sired 9 foals as a stallion. *Y.S. Kinyobi was out of his first foal crop and is now successfully standing stud for Trish Rosborough. I personally held onto his last two foals, *Truman Obi and *Theodore Obi, who are now coming 4 years old this fall.
Jobi also got the chance to spend a year with me in Seattle, WA studying French Classical Dressage. Aside from that, Jobi has been shown at several of the Bashkir Curly breed shows, in a few open shows, and used to help represent the breed at the Midwest Horse Fair every year in Madison, Wisconsin. For the most part over the last couple of years his main responsibility has only been to long-distance trail riding with me and my Paint gelding, Scout. But alas, the ‘performance’ ring calls again!
Preparation
I’ve had to think a lot about what exactly I want to do for this ride. It has been a while since I’ve had to put anything together of this nature, so I have probably taken more weeks to get an idea than I would have hoped to. Now it’s just to pull it together. So let’s look at the skeleton of what I have figured out so far.
Outline Idea
I have 10 minutes approximately in the arena. It might not seem like that much time, but in some ways it can be an eternity when performing in the arena. Not to mention working just the right music into that time frame. Originally I had the idea to swap costumes throughout the ride. Come in as one famous person, and through a clever system of layering costumes I could move through a myriad of different characters by removing those layers. While I still like this idea, the amount of time I have to put together that many costumes and have the act down solid… I’m thinking that I should simplify.
Plan two was to ride in as one famous character – preferably a female, with a long skirt, and have a ‘goody bag’ of sorts tucked under the edge of the skirt that I can pull props out of and play along with the first song I have picked out. I’m liking this idea better, not only because it will take less time to put together props than it will to make costumes, but I will already be in costume for the second song in my play list.
The second half of my ride I am planning to ride to Wild Horses by Alicia Keys & Adam Levine, with me as the lady, and my steed decked out with a chestedo (chest tuxedo).
Practice Makes Perfect
So now, where am I with practice? Well, there are certain elements that I want my pony to perform that I would like to hammer down more solidly. Most notably, a lay down at the second refrain of the second song. Jobi lays down very nice, but I would like for it to become a bit more instantaneous rather than him hanging for a second or two checking out the scenery (or the ‘bed’). There are other portions, including several rears and some tight canter circles in hand, that I would also like to smooth out. They are nice, and one could hardly complain, but I do try to prepare well…
I also like to believe that Mr. Jobi likes to prepare, so with that I though perhaps a nod to his patient preparation and waiting in the tie stalls.
Our first day of practice consisted of working in hand on canter departs and canter to halt transitions into rearing and back to canter. We also laid down several times and then proceeded to some nice canter work under saddle. The majority of the riding portion will be with Jobi at the canter, since much of it will be my acting ‘skills’ (or lack thereof… haha), coupled with some spicy tricks on his part.
All in all, a good first day. More to follow!
