w/ Jim Graham
Empire was so wonderful at the show. He never hollered once at other horses, (even the very tempting mares) he handled the judge's booth like a champ, and was even content to stand and watch eveything not once fussing. What I was most proud of was how he handled the warm-up ring. The warm-up area was a regular sized dressage arena with WAY too many horses in it (anywhere from 15 to 20 at a time) and very few observing the proper ring technique for passing and so on. There were also some horses with major behavioral problems (bucking, rearing, bolting) and Empire just ignored them and focused on his job. What makes this so amazing is that he had only been in under saddle, training consistently for about 3 months and that the times I'm most often able to ride him are during the evenings when there are no other horses in our rings. Empire had almost not experience working around other horses before this show and he was awsome!
Oh yeah, he also scored pretty well too. He came home with 2 first places for Intro A (we added an extra class) and a 4th place for Intro B (that abcess was still flaring up at the canter so we didn't enter any Training classes).
On Sunday, the day of the clinic, I was so nervous! Jim was a much more advanced trainer than I was used to working with, and here I was bringing a green OTTB for his clinic! Everything was awsome and Jim was easy to work with, although he did want to know why I wanted to ride stallions. Empire was awsome once again, and this was his first time jumping in an open field (tons of room!!) rather than an enclosed arena. The jumps at Jim's farm, while not very tall, were more solid and usually wider than what Empire was used to seeing at home. In some of the pictures Empire looks a little lazy (which he can be) but most of the time he was looking at the jumps and thinking about his job. He was wonderful most of the day and only got a little frisky once when we were jumping up and down a bank. It was a little nerve racking for me, but I think he was just enjoying himself so much he had to have that little burst of canter up the hill! I was terribly proud of him, ecspecially when several people at the farm came by his stall to visit and tell me what a wonderfully well behaved stallion I had! They were most impressed with how attentive he was to his job even with the other horses (and mares) around.
Empire and I learned so much that day, and we are both anticipating going back sometime soon.