I'd never been to Equitana, and was always planning to go this year, and then Ira and I were invited to be demo riders for the Para-Dressage showcase during the Friday night show! WOW!! I couldn't believe it... what an honour to be asked to ride at such a prestigious event! Of course I said yes... but the nerves were already kicking in... but lucky for my my right-hand-(wo)man was my good friend Nicola Essex with her gorgeous grey gelding, Craighaven Allanon (aka Denim). I couldn't have wished for a more perfect person to be sharing this whole experience with! Especially as Equitana offered us two "Educator" slots over the weekend to promote Para Equestrian, which meant we had to plan two more demonstrations - one in-hand and one ridden. We of course accepted these slots with much excitement!
Equitana week soon rolled around, and we packed up, loaded Ira and set off for Auckland on Wednesday morning. We had our arena familiarisation/night show rehearsal booked in for 5.30pm in the main arena, and I was excited and nervous to see where we were going to be riding.
Claudia hopped on Ira at 5pm and gave him a workout before we headed to our familiarisation session. Ira looked amazing! Unfortunately the arena familiarisation session didn't go as well as hoiped, and Ira was quite spooky and unsettled. We only had a 30 minute slot which wasn't enough time to get him settled enough for me to get on, but the organisers were amazing and managed to extend the arena opening time so we could come back and try again at 7pm. This time I was able to get on and had a quick ride around the arena on the lead rein (Ira still felt a bit tense). Again, the Equitana organisers were amazing, and managed to squeeze us into another familiarisatin slot - at 7.15am the next morning!!
So it was a very early start on Thursday to get us all into the arena at 7.15am. This time I got on and had the lead unclipped, and Nic and I started to run through our freestyle for the first time in the arena. All was going well until someone popped out from a door in the corner and Ira put the brakes on fast - and I flopped forward onto his neck! I went forward so fast that before I knew it I was down over his shoulder and facing the ground, thinking ouch - this is going tot hurt! But in that split second, Jody and Lucy grabbed my leg and caught me and stopped me falling off phew! AMAZING WORK YOU GUYS!!!
After a quick push upright and shift back into riding position again, and off we went to run through the rest of our freestyle. The show must go on after all!
The rest of the session went well, but we made the decision there and then that I would have sidewalkers for the demos just in case!
Friday evening rolled around and Nic and I were super excited to get in the arena and ride! Kyrie turned out Ira and Denim to perfection, and our crew were all kitted out in Team Para gear, and into the arena we went. The wonderful Kerrin Beatson gave us a lovely introduction, our music started and we were offf. OMG it was so much fun! Both Ira and Denim absolutely loved being in the limelight, and were both absolutely perfect! (what were we all worrying about ay? hehe!) We all came out of the arena on a complete high - we loved every second and wanted to go right back in and do it again! It was such an amazing experience!
Our focus was shifted to our next demo on Saturday, which was a close-up, on the ground talk through everything Para - from initial classification, compensating aids, training styles and methods to how competition is structured both in NZ and on the international stage. We took both Denim and Ira with us to show the gear and adaptive aids we use, and once again, both boys behaved perfectly. Nic and I bounced off each other well, considering we were both "winging it' without any scripts! We figured we live and breathe para so would have plenty to talk about, and it worked. I've said it before, but I couldn't have asked for a more perfect partner in crime to do this with! Love ya Nic!
Sunday was our ridden demo, and we were lucky to have Jody Hartstone present for us while Nic and I rode. We demonstrated everything from mounting, our equipment, compensating aids, how we ride differently to an "able bodied" person, how we need to train our horses, movements we ride in our tests, right through to dismounting. It was so much fun and we had a nice crowd of people interested too which was great for raising awareness of the sport.
Overall, it was an absolutely fantastic 5 days! Huge thanks to Equitana Auckland for giving us the chance to showcase Para Equestrian to everyone at the show. The Equitana crew and volunteers were brilliant, the facilities were beautiful, and we enjoyed every moment of it! A million thanks to our amazing crew who looked after Nic and I, as well as our superstar ponies so amazingly. Love you guys!