Halt! And stand still.

That was what we trained today with Ivanhoe

Videos!

We have had such a great time training with Ivanhoe this week. First the world champion level driver Ben Simonsen came to our stable with some other combined drivers from our area for training. We drove both dressage and the new marathon obsticles we have at our stable and it was sooooo nice to have some folks over to use our facilities. Had the best time ever just to see the other drivers drive here. It is quite a lonely hobby as there is so few drivers nearby and to most training opportunities we have always 150-400 km drive...

 

This is Ivanhoe av Friheten driven by Ben, he was such a star!

 

To get some ideas of how to start driving Thorin Ax, 3 years old,
Ben drove him long reins to demonstrate. Thorin did very well.

 

Lumina in full speed at the marathon obsticle we got 

sponsored by Svaravars Trävaruhandel 

And of course Ben wanted to try Ivanhoe at the marathon obsticle :D :D :D

Yesterday I got suddenly a second chance to training this week with Sanna Tirkkonen. Always interesting to train for different coaches as they look at different things, so got good feedback again for training as she had several things she pointed out in my driving. Ivanhoe was not as good as at home and the riding course was a bit too heavy for a Shetland with a heavy carriage.

 

Ivanhoe yesterday

So Ivanhoe had two hard work trainings this week and today I thought it is best to do shortly some long reining since it is easy and you can do different things than in driving, kind of gymnastics for the pony. Ivanhoe worked so nicely today! I had seen a video of a Finnhorse stallion Friisin Paletti doing shoulder-ins and diagonal yielding with carriage in trot, so as we have done it with Ivanhoe in walk long reining a few times, I thought why not try in trot today. Here you see on video him doing shoulder-in in trot in this direction first time ever, nice work of two newbies!!!???

After such a week you feel really inspired again!

Blinkers or not?

After I published a photograph of our stallion Verano Lee v.d. Zandkamp being driven without blinkers on Facebook in Shetland Pony Driving group it got comments and I also got some PM asking about driving without blinkers.

Here we come to a cultural and traditional difference between countries, so I'll tell how things work in Finland :) Here the tradition comes from working horses and the tradition of driving one of the most versatile horse breeds in the world, the Finnhorse. It is a hard working breed adapted to northern circumstances and they where used in all purposes, to pull timber from woods, farmwork and as "vechicle". In Finnish tradition horses are driven without blinkers in all work - and they did pull anything. Nowadays Finnhorses are mostly used as trotters and as hobby horses in all sports from riding to work horse, and from combined driving to riding school ponies - and the tradition remains - in everyday life blinkers are not used. In hobby driving or when trotters are trained in roads, woods or training centers, blinkers might be used if the horse stares at things, so that the blinkers helps the horse to concentrate and be more confident but most horses in Finland are driven without. 

With trotters of course, some horses may use blinkers in races, though they would be trained without, and there is several types of blinkers used, some prevent the horse from looking back, other prevent looking both back and to sides and some has a mechanism that allows the driver to pull the blinkers down in the end of the race, and get an extra gear as the horse suddenly don't see its competitors by its sides and starts to answer to their challenge!

Then of course the few drivers having combined driving as a hobby, drive their horses with blinkers as the tradition in classic carriage driving is in Central Europe and UK. Here the point is to help the horse concentrate in the task and not to, for examle, stare at the whip, in pairs it also helps concentrating as one of the horses will no see if the coach uses the whip on the other horse and then only the horse used on reacts at the effect, in teams again blinkers protects the wheelers eyes from the leaders reins and so on, so there is of course a number of logical reasons why blinkers are a smart choice in driving. A horse driven with blinkers don't also mind how high or wide the thing he is pulling is - which also certainly must be a reason why blinkers have been used in the first place (we can here forget for a while that Finnhorses did the same things without :D )

So when do I use blinkers and when not. My opinion is that the horse should see and know what he is pulling when broken to drive, I would say most horses benefit of seeing as they then also know exactly where the sounds come from, I've seen more horses scared of the sounds than scared of the view. So when we break to harness we long rein the horse with no blinkers, when it works well and the youngster also accept different sounds behind, we also long rein with blinkers and do the same stuff as we did without. In most cases we also start driving with carriage without blinkers. Of course there might come exceptions and then we would drive with blinkers - no need to make a decision of an opinion in forehand, take one horse at the time and do as it suits best with that horse. After we know the horse is fine without blinkers we also train with them. So in the end we have a horse which can be driven for fun and pleasure without blinkers and when I train dressage and for competition where the blinkers are a tradition - I use blinkers - and the horse is relaxed and pleased both ways. That is exactly the same logic as with trotting horses in Finland, they might be driven both ways. Of course you might also find a person who does it just the opposite way as I do, starts with blinkers and take them later off. 

We even drove these two in pair with no blinkers, prefered to see their eyes and expressions myself also as the mare did not appriciate the gelding so much in pair in the beginning. I know someone else would have done the opposite and used blinkers to prevent the mare to see the gelding but well... I don't thing they are that stupid ;) she would anyway know who she works with :) Now we of course drive with blinkers to help the concentrate on the work not staring at what I ask of them separately

The fun thing with blinkers is that some horses get relaxed with them and concentrate while others become energetic and even too hot to drive, so you really have to concider the horses personal temperament when making the decision how to drive. Regardless what kind of a personality the horse is we drive both ways and of course that has to be thought of when they are learning new things. Ivanhoe, for example, who is a former trotting race pony (yes, we have trotting races with Shetlands in the Nordic countries, too!) gets very energetic and excited with blinkers but now after two years of driving the classic way instead of like a trotting horse he is fine- except for on marathon where he still would not like bigger horses to pass him from behind as he remembers the trotting races where you really shoud not let anyone pass you... :D So I drive dressage and cones with blinkers and marathon without which calms him a bit as he sees who is coming from behind!

Dressage with...

... marathon without!

My point would be, teach the horse both ways and you get a safe companion in all situations and know your horse! So if you say you use the blinkers because the horse is afraid of what he is pulling if he sees it, I would say someone has been too lazy to teach the horse to accept what he sees :) and then of course I have to admit there always might be a superb driving horse which just can't handle it without blinkers... But in general and from any point of view it is only a benefit and a safety issue to teach them properly in any way. So it would not be necessary to have blinkers, but in competition, as it is also a part of the tradition, I'm happy to use them anyway.

My Precious - Verano Lee v.d. Zandkamp

A photoshoot by the sea...

 

 

Combined driving competition in Wiurila

So everything seems to happen in August! I got unexpected work as equine teacher at the equine collage in Kaustinen, a school that educated grooms specialized in taking care of trotting race horses (but also farriers etc.) and on program was also combined driving competition last weekend, breeding evaluation show at Wednesday and would have been performance classes finals at Sunday - which we just had to leave for others - and in two weeks we take Gwaihir Ax, a yearling colt, to southern Finland for onward transport to Denmark where he is sold as stallion potential! And if this would not be enough Undying Lands a standardbred trotter bred by us and sold to Sweden as yearling has taken two victories on races, too! So a lot of exciting things has been going on. 

At the mare and foal assessment we showed Jenniefer with  I (gold) as well as her 2 year old filly Humledals Nayeli, also Gwaihir Ax got I. Eowyn Ax 2 yr old filly and Nenya Ax, Jenniefers summer foal got II (silver). Eowyn was not at all as she is normally and we think they have some kind of flu as some others also have now snot in their noses as Eowyn did after the show.

 Eowyn Ax, 2 yr old filly, II (silver)

 Mare Jenniefer I (gold), filly foal Nenya Ax II (silver)

 Humledals Nayeli I (gold)

 Gwaihir Ax I (gold)

So last week on Friday we packed our caravan car and my friends trailer with two persons belongings, two ponies and their equipment and headed for Southern Finland and Salo and the combined driving competition at Wiurila Mansion. We stopped many times as summer finally arrived in Finland and it was over +20 C degrees, pit stops where made of course at Hööks and Viljar Shop horse equipment stores perfectly situated along the way to Salo :D It took 10 hours to get there...

When we arrived the first thing was to get the trailer parked (easily said than done in a very narrow spot), accommondate the ponies and give them hay and water, find a grocery store, then off to the dressage and cones arena which we found out was not at Wiurila but 1,5 km away and to there learn the cones track as the competition was a two day event and dressage and cones was driven after one another at Saturday. After we thought we could drive the cones off we went to the stables and took the ponies for a walk. Then as we did not want to panic in the morning with our early starts, we put the carriages back together as they had to be in pieces for the transport. Finally at 23 o'clock we got much needed sleep. We also realized that the timetable for Saturday did not match with what was said in the invitation, where my friends class was mentioned to be last of the day, that had made us think we had lots of time to be grooms for each other as I knew from experience that my easy level class would probably be first of the day. But they had changed the timetables and so our classes was after one another in the morning and now with the 1,5 km drive in both directions for both our Shetlands (not going very fast...) and of course it was sunny and a very hot ay right from the morning. So we decided that my friend drives her pony to the competition and I drive there with the caravan car and go to the competition office to explain the problem, that I come back with my pony as fast as it is possible to be able to start in my class and that we did not expect this timetable problem as the invitation said we had plenty of time. The arranger promised to move me last in the group if I would not get in time back, so one stress factor less. My friend drove a nice first start ever in combined driving and I headed back to the stable to harness Ivanhoe.

As we then walked and walked to the competition arena I thought we would dry out before we get there it was so so hot and Ivanhoe was already sweatty after just walking! He has his wintercoat on its way already poor thing! But I think he did a very nice dressage program and has certainly developed from last years single competitions so I was very pleased. I then drove the cones with a clear round but not very fast as I wanted to spare him a bit after the long drive from home to the competition and due the hot weather. 

 Ivanhoe still goes easlily both under bit and with mouth open

 But the good parts are very good and we get more of this

 Both bowing in the end :)

 Ivanhoe is usually fast at cones, he knows the point of it and as a former trotting pony he just keeps on going, in easy level in Finland we are not allowed to gallop

Then it was again a walk back to the stables and grooming to pony, hay and water and then some food for the coaches too :) At Sunday I would drive marathon so we had four marathon obsticles with just three ports/gates to learn but as it was so easy, it was done quickly. Then again some pony grooming and in the evening the coaches dinner.

Wiurila mansion, well not the mansion but their old farmhouse for cattle! Nowadays a place for meetings, weddings etc. Here we had our coaches dinner

At Sunday morning we got up early and packed everything we could ready and drove the trailer to another place because it would have been difficult to get it away from its previous place due to the marathon route. At 10 o'clock we took Ivanhoe and harnessed and I started driving towards start as my start time was 10.35. Suddenly I realized the left tire was empty! I turned around and thought I need a miracle to get to the startline in time, had no idea if we even had an air pump with us... Shouted to my friend to go and tell the competiton office and as it was a camping trailer I saw them giving my friend a pump. So she pumped and pumped and we then realize the tire was broken and would not keep the air in. Suddenly she said, stupid us, we have HER gig, too! At this point the clock was ticking fast at it was already 10.15, we stood 250 meter from the trailer and her gig was in pieces for the transport, we had 20 minutes. We unharnessed Ivanhoe and I quickly took the notes, spare whip and knife off my gig and we run to our car, my friend started screwing the  shafts and the seat and I held Ivanhoe and taped the notes and knife on the new carriage and added the carriage number. Then we had to fit the traces to the gig and can you imagine - we made it!!! I even had time to calm done a few minutes before my turn! Unbelievable! And this was two persons who worried in beforehand how we can manage the technical bit of the sport without men :D I would say faster than with them! 

 

Oh yes, I sit a bit low here but we made it :D

Marathon then went fluently except one miss at the third obsticle where Ivanhoe probably though himself that the next gate was in front of us and did not answer to my turning aids and so we ended up with his nose against a pole but a quick turn and off we went again. I was then surprised that we still placed second after all the trouble both in marathon and in total results! This was a class with 7 participants and the others where all bigger ponies and horses and one overheigh shetland. Ivanhoe was groomed and washed and then we packed once again before driving back home, 9 hours this time. I can tell you I slept well when I finally got my head on the pillow back home at midnight!