Before you enter you first event you must be certain that you are prepared for the big day. That means you know your dressage test, have ridden it numerous times and are confident to ride a positive test.

It is important that you also practice jumping over various stadium courses to acclimate your horse to strange looking standards and poles like the ones you may encounter at your first event.

Finally, gallop over cross country jumps of a wide variety in preperation for the course you will be required to jump the day of the event. Test yourself over drops, banks, ditches, water and logs. It is always a good idea to know that your horse will jump confidently on the day of the competition.

Show nerves always play a part on the day of competition. Learn to channel this extra tension in a positive way so that it does not create problems like forgetting your dressage test or stadium course. Enter each arena as if this is practice and take the pressure of winning off your shoulders. Just ride the best you can the day of the show and you will do well. Remember, if anything does go wrong, take it in stride and continue with your ride. Even the top riders encounter these situations, and only the best riders handle these mishaps with grace and dignity.

Go out and have fun! Know that you have done your homework and are prepared for your first event.

This entry was posted on Saturday, August 5th, 2006 at 9:22 pm and is filed under Cross Country. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.