The weekend of Dec. 14-16, saw Orion and I at the Frankfurt Festhalle Competition. We arrived in Frankfurt on wednesday so that we had the thursday to school in the competition arena before the Grand Prix which was on friday. I also took my new mare “Fabella” along this weekend so that she had a chance to get introduced to the international competition scene. Considering that Fabella is 10, and has never been to such a large scale competition including having never stabled in temporary stables, she dealt with the whole weekend like a true pro. I was very proud of her because the Frankfurt Festhalle is that it is a very ‘Cozy” environment... when I say cozy I mean that its great for the spectators because they are nice and close to the competition ring, for the horses its sometimes “a tiny bit” intimidating. The other aspect that makes the Festhalle even more cozy is that its Christmas time! And they do a fabulous job decorating the whole venue with Christmas lights and candles everywhere. Each of the letters for the competition ring are held up by these little Santa Clauses and in every corner there is a beautiful Christmas tree with twinkling lights. As you can see it my description this horse show has a very “Merry” atmosphere ;-) Which made it a great learning experience for Fabella. As most of you can guess, Orion was not such a big fan of the merry and cozy atmosphere, but this time I was determined to put into action everything we had learned from our previous competition in Stuttgart.
There is this great saying in German “Man wechs mit seinem aufgaben” translated this means “you grow with the challenges you are faced with”. I could go on a continue to find excuses for why this competition atmosphere wasn’t the ideal setting for Orion and I.... But what I would really like to share is how much I learned from the challenges I was faced with. On friday as Orion and I rode through the Grand Prix test we had some great highlights, for example we scored a 9 for one of our canter pirouettes! And I am finally getting 8’s for Orion’s extravagant passage. Unfortunately we had a couple expensive mistakes. In the two tempi changes we had a mistake because Orion got distracted by the beautiful Christmas tree on the diagonal ahead of us, but I take full blame, because I most certainly know that Orion is a horse that is extremely sensitive and aware of his surroundings, which means that I need to be that much MORE clear with my aids. I was pretty frustrated with my self after the Grand Prix because there were so many scenarios in our test that I know I could have been a better support for Orion. Overall we scored a 65.66% and placed 9th not our best result, but we qualified ourselves for the freestyle on sunday.
When Orion and I entered the ring on Sunday we both had our game faces on and we had a much better go because in every moment that Orion got distracted by the camera and video crew or the bright lights, I was able to channel my determination into Orion and he carried on like the warrior that he is. We scored 69.3% and placed 6th. As I have already mentioned above, these are not Orion’s and I’s best results, but I can honestly say that I have never learned so much during the span of one competition. First and foremost the biggest lesson that I learned during this competition is the power of passion and determination. As everyone knows competing at the top level of any sport is down right tough! And everyday we train long and hard so that we can be the best that we can be, during a competition when various factors prevent you from being your best, the feeling of frustration can sometimes be overwhelming. Now the true challenge is to turn ones frustration into a positive sense of determination. It stings to lose, but I have learned, that battles as lessons to be learned and nobody wins them all. And as frustrating as it is to make mistakes and to not do as well as one would have liked, this is often the best opportunity to learn the most. I have mentioned this quote by Winston Churchill before but I would like to mention it again because it has so much wisdom to it: “Success is not final, Failure is not fatal, it is the courage to continue that counts”... and continue we will. Watch out 2013... here we come :-)
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